Using a participatory impact assessment framework to evaluate a community‐led mangrove and fisheries conservation approach in West Kalimantan, Indonesia

Abstract

Abstract Community‐based conservation has been identified as a solution to biodiversity loss, climate change and the reduction of rural poverty. The heterogeneity in social and economic inequalities often acts as a barrier to community engagement in resource management and further inhibits the distributional equity of social and ecological outcomes. This study presents a participatory impact assessment (PIA) framework that evaluated the outcomes of a cross‐sector community‐led conservation initiative. Community members involved in the programme identified activities and outcomes for the conservation cooperative (CC), ranking the influence of the former on the latter as well as their daily life through multiple focus group discussions (FGDs). Participants were asked to rank the impact of activities on outcomes and the scale of the outcome which was totalled to identify the most impactful programme activities and outcomes during the project period. Community members reported improved income, health, education and the creation of a locally led natural resource management system. Members also reported improved crab harvest rates and reduced mangrove deforestation. Environmental outcomes identified by community members through the PIA were verified through a secondary spatial analysis and mud crab independent fisheries monitoring. The results support the hypothesis that environmental non‐governmental organizations (NGOs) need to consider a multi‐dimensional view of human well‐being, and that cross‐sector integrated interventions may be effective at improving multiple outcomes. Future steps should focus on spatial replication of the CC programme which will provide further insights by testing for differences in outcomes between villages, how those are impacted by pre‐existing social and ecological systems and comparing outcomes between control sites that did not receive interventions. A free Plain Language Summary can be found within the Supporting Information of this article.