Our Stories
More Than 5,000 Lives Changed,
Here Are 25 of Them
As experts in conservation economics for over 25 years, our unique, practical economics and finance training teaches key concepts and tools to environmental professionals around the world, helping transform the relationship between conservation and development.
Our training has changed the way conservationists approach their work, and has created lasting positive impact on them as individuals, on their organizations and institutions, and on the health of their environments and communities.
Our Stories
Alumni Stories
From protecting the Resplendent Quetzal in Panama and increasing Peru’s protected area budget by 400%, to encouraging community-based conservation in Bhutan, CSF alumni are using economic tools to protect people and nature all over the world.
Eyra Harbar
Wilson Cabral
Paulo Garcia
Fani Mamede
“The Jalapão study put a thematic mark on my career. Ever since then, I’ve been able to focus on the environment and ecological economics as my main theme of research.”
Dr. Ezekiel Dembe
- 2003
Protecting the Resplendent Quetzal in Panama’s Volcán Barú National Park
Ezequiel Miranda
Presidente de la Asociación para la Conservación de la Biosfera
CSF Study: Volcán Baru National Park and the Quetzal Trail, in partnership with The Nature ConservancyIn 2003, three road investments were proposed in the vicinity of the Barú Volcano National Park in Chiriquí province, Panama. The first, a one-lane road from Cerro Punta to Boquete, via the Park. The second, a so-called “southern route” outside the park, from Cuesta de Piedra to Boquete via Palmira, and the third paving the access roads as far as the guard stations at the Park’s Eastern and Western entrances. CSF and The Nature Conservancy (TNC) conducted an economic analysis of the proposals between February and April, 2003. We employed the “Roads Economic Decision Model,” developed by the World Bank in 1999. The research was jointly funded by TNC and Conservation International, and was one of several factors that led to cancellation of the proposed road through the park. The lower-impact “Southern Route” was selected instead.
According to local leader Ezekiel Miranda, who lives in the shadow of the volcano, “If we didn’t have a study like the one produced by CSF and TNC, it would have been impossible to prove to the government that there were economic facts telling us that this project wasn’t feasible and that there was a better alternative.”
Watch this video to learn more about our study:
Ezequiel Miranda
“If we didn’t have a study like the one produced by CSF and TNC, it would have been impossible to prove to the government that there were economic facts telling us that this project wasn’t feasible and that there was a better alternative.”
- 2005
Fighting Big Oil and Winning
Ephrem Balole
Virunga National Park Officer,
Democratic Republic of the Congo
CSF Course: Economic Tools for ConservationVirunga is the oldest national park in Africa; the 1.9-million acre, Congolese retreat hosts an incredible array of vegetation, landforms, and wildlife. So in the summer of 2010, when SOCO International—a half-billion-dollar, British-based energy exploration company—received permission to probe for oil inside the storied park, Balole rolled up his sleeves. The 45 year-old Virunga planning officer and CSF alum worked hard to keep the park from being poked, prodded, and potentially scarred by SOCO.
After taking our Economic Tools for Conservation course, Balole knew that if he made a strong enough economic argument for investing in conservation instead of SOCO, he could prevent environmental destruction and rescue the threatened gorilla population in the park from SOCO’s development.
Then the turf war really began. SOCO launched a high-profile, goodwill campaign, promising that its oil searching efforts would bring Virunga communities school, jobs, roads and better livelihoods and, in the end, $200,000 in generated revenue. Balole, however, was ready to fight a battle of metrics. Via cost-benefit analysis, he proved that nature conservation would provide a greater economic boost to the communities surrounding Virunga than oil exploration. He illustrated that a robust park—complete with food services, lodging infrastructure, and transportation services—could generate as much as that every year, and that park tourism overall could easily contribute to the region annually. A Virunga without oil exploration, Balole added, has already provided its local communities with nine schools, a healthcare center, tree plantations, a networked water supply, and a hydroelectric dam. In fact, park policy has been to share 30 percent of its revenues with the communities that it hosts.
“Virunga National Park is the key to increasing tourism in our country based on its location and what it has to offer. The schools, health care centers, roads, dams, tree plantations, biomass briquettes and employment all help alleviate poverty,” says Balole “All of this already exists; it is more than what is expected from the oil companies.”
Balole was able to place an economic valuation on the park’s wildlife. The cost of oil activity affecting the lives and habitations of animals that included Virunga’s elephants, hippopotami, and buffalo could be high. There was also the potential cost of oil exploration on resources like Lake Edward and its outlying savannas. Plus Virunga is home to several hundred of the remaining 800 or so mountain gorillas still in existence. Putting a price on the value of these gorillas is an impossible task.
In late 2010, Balole and others from Virunga National Park met with government policy-makers and members of the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s parliament. They explained themselves and provided their metrics—and obviously made an impression. In response to legal opposition and pragmatic arguments like Ephrem’s, SOCO International announced plans to abandon their oil concession in Virunga, a commitment reiterated in March of 2015. Balole, it could be said, saved Virunga’s skin and more.
Ephrem Balole
“Virunga National Park is the key to increasing tourism in our country based on its location and what it has to offer. The schools, health care centers, roads, dams, tree plantations, biomass briquettes and employment all help alleviate poverty. All of this already exists; it is more than what is expected from the oil companies.”
- 2005
A Case for Coiba National Park
Shutterstock, Matyas Rehak
Ricardo Montenegro
Alliance for Conservation and Development, Panama
CSF Course: Mesoamerica Economic Tools for ConservationCoastal habitats worldwide produce billions of dollars in fishing and tourism income. In drawing up a management plan for one of its premier coastal sites, the Coiba National Park, Panama’s government was faced with decisions over how to make the most of the island gem’s economic potential without damaging its fragile ecosystems. In 2007, CSF joined the Smithsonian Institution and Conservation International to answer that question.
The 430,825-acre marine preserve is a one-time prison colony rich with old-growth forests, coral reefs, and sea life. The park is an island paradise, 14 miles from Panama’s Pacific coast and teeming with hundreds of species of sea life that include parrotfish, maidens, marlin, sharks and crocodiles. With only six primitive government-run cabins on the island, many resort developers could just imagine the money to be made on a sprawling, four-star hotel.
CSF course graduate Ricardo Montenegro’s research made it clear that Coiba could generate ample benefits without a lot of construction. He found that less fishing and modest visitor infrastructure were consistent with sustaining a long-term stream of benefits to locals and to the broader economy.
Montenegro argued that the area’s artisanal fishermen were thriving, and should be left to make a relatively comfortable living—instead of potentially suffering, along with the islands and outlying areas, from overfishing. He reported that Coiba’s tourists, many of them scuba divers and snorkelers, find the destination to be a good value.
Montenegro and CSF suggested that concessionaires be invited to offer revenue-generating services—as long as they worked within very strict environmental standards. Finally, Montenegro showed that the revenue already generated by the park justified that more money was available to be funneled back into park management and oversight (the plan suggested 11 million USD over five years).
“What the study basically proved,” says Montenegro, “is that a better use of many existing park tourism services could generate the resources needed to cover future costs.” That means that Coiba, without being overhauled or turned into an amusement park, could largely take care of itself.
The Panamanian National Environment Authority used this information in the development of the park’s master plan.
Ricardo Montenegro
“What the study basically proved, is that a better use of many existing park tourism services could generate the resources needed to cover future costs.”
- 2006
Increasing Peru’s Protected Area Budget by 400%
Shutterstock, Alva Robueno
Fernando León
Peru Ministry of the Environment
CSF Course: Economic Tools for ConservationAfter attending CSF’s Economic Tools for Conservation course at Stanford in 2006, Fernando used his new economic analysis methods to publish a report estimating the monetary contribution of Peru’s protected areas to the national economy. “The report convinced the Ministry of Economy and Finance to increase the budget for the protected areas system by 400 percent” Fernando shared with us.
Years later Fernando joined Peru’s Ministry of Environment and reached out to CSF for help designing the country’s policy, to compensate for development impacts that can’t practically be avoided. CSF helped the Ministry craft the first policy framework and later worked with several other prominent groups on detailed guidelines, approved as official policy in December 2014. Now builders of roads, power plants, mines and other big projects will have an incentive to minimize environmental impacts, and will offset any that do happen. All this in a country with an expanse of rich tropical forest the size of California.
Fernando León
“The report convinced the Ministry of Economy and Finance to increase the budget for the protected areas system by 400 percent.”
- 2007
Pulling People out of Poverty With a Park
Shutterstock, Vaclav Matous
Paola Lozano
CSF Research Fellow
CSF Study: Economic Valuation of Natural Resources of Bolivian Protected AreasThe Arbol de Piedra, or “Stone Tree,” is a lone 20-foot rock that over the course of time has been sculpted by wind and sand to look like a resilient yet stunted tree. It’s a good metaphor for the tough life on the Andean high plains, and the icon of Bolivia’s Eduardo Abaroa National Wildlife Reserve.
The popular 1.7 million-acre park is often likened to Yellowstone for its mix of geysers, hot springs, moonscapes, and mountains. It draws roughly 80,000 visitors annually, but its vastness and isolation (650 miles from La Paz) make oversight difficult. Tailings from in-park mining sites and a lack of public facilities have contributed to park pollution. Visitors drive over fragile land. In surrounding communities, 99.4 percent of the population lives in poverty.
In 2007, Conservation Strategy Fund research fellow Paola Lozano set about discovering how much visitors would be willing to pay in entry fees if the park could upgrade its facilities and management. She surveyed over 225 visitors, with eye-opening results.
Survey participants—most of them European tourists—said they’d willingly spend approximately 85 to 90 percent more money for a great park experience. In exchange for the almost $50 per day in extra spending, participants said they’d expect improvements to the park’s infrastructure, including better roads and hospitality services.
Paola advised park management that entry fees for foreign visitors could be raised from $4 to as much as $30 without significantly reducing their numbers. After some deliberation, her recommendation was accepted in 2010 and fees were raised to $20 for international visitors and kept at $4 for nationals. The 80,000 visitors that year were nearly identical to the 2009 numbers. The resulting five-fold gain in revenues in 2010 opened new possibilities for revenue-sharing with the local communities of Quetana Grande and Quetana Chico, whose income from the park multiplied by a factor of seven, to over $500,000 annually, while still increasing entry-fee income for park management to nearly triple its former total.
Paola’s story is just one example of how economic expertise can lead to environmental gains and an increase in the livelihoods of those that call it home.
- 2007
Valuing the Cultural and Natural Heritage of Bolivia’s Torotoro National Park
Shutterstock, Belikova Oksana
Sophia Espinoza
Project Coordinator and Analyst, Conservation Strategy Fund
CSF Fellowship: CSF Southern Tropical Andes FellowshipTorotoro National Park (PNTT) is one of the 22 protected areas of national importance in Bolivia and is located in the north of the Potosí department. This 16,570 hectare area is characterized by a great variety of natural and cultural resources which, in turn, constitute tourist attractions. The park preserves unique geological formations, the country’s largest chain of caves, dinosaur remains and footprints and animal and plant fossils, and ruins that indicate the presence of ancient cultures.
In 2007, the Torotoro Municipal Development Plan (2003-2007) revealed a progressive degradation of natural resources and decrease in the quality of the environment within and surrounding the park. Considering that environment problems and overexploitation of natural resources are consequences, in part, of their non-valuation and an inadequate national and regional policy of administrative support, CSF research fellow, Sophia Espinoza conducted a study to make recommendations for the sustainable management of the natural and cultural resources that PNTT offers. Sophia did this by conducting an environmental valuation of the park’s many resources and services. While the values considered in this study represent only a part of the total benefit of the park’s natural and cultural resources, Sophia’s valuation presented a clearer picture of the value of Torotoro’s natural and cultural heritage for more strategic management.
Sophia Espinoza
“Thanks to CSF’s support, my thesis was a success and I was able to launch my career as an environmental economist.”
Hear from Sophia about her work with CSF
- 2009
Protecting Community Forest Reserves in Papua New Guinea
Native women dance in circle during traditional Enga cultural show in Wabag, capital of Enga Province, Papua New Guinea.
Shutterstock, Michal KnitlTheresa Kas
The Nature Conservancy
CSF Course: Economic Tools for ConservationAfter attending Conservation Strategy Fund’s Economic Tools for Conservation course in 2009, Theresa Kas visited the small village of Sohoneliu in her home country of Papua New Guinea. Once she arrived, she realized much of the forest had been depleted to the extent that wild animals had lost much of their habitat and the river was full of sediment and pollution from the local quarry. Theresa took the initiative and began meeting with local community members living where many had converted precious forests into farmland. Using the skills she had acquired from the training course at CSF, she conducted a cost-benefit analysis to evaluate the true cost of these unsustainable practices. They soon realized that the true economic cost was far greater than the benefit of the harvest and quarry development. In addition, the villagers realized that prior to the degradation of the forest, their quality of life and diversity of diet were much healthier. As a result, the costs of health care as well as various illnesses related to their current diet had increased.
In response, they have made a decision to allocate all of the community forest and land they own into proper land use and management plans. Today, the people of Sohoneliu community are developing management plans for about 10,000 hectares of forest. Their lessons and experiences have now influenced villages beyond their own. Inland communities of Papua New Guinea have now allocated an estimated 100,000 hectares of traditional land and forest into a proper land use and management plan. Theresa concludes, “They now realize that a healthy environment will lead to healthy people.”
Theresa Kas
“They now realize that a healthy environment will lead to healthy people.”
Lhendup Tharchen
Paula Andrea Zuluaga
Sangeeta Mangubhai
John Burgos
Ehdra "Eed" Beta Masran
Widhya Nugroho Satrioajie
Shinta Yuniarta
- 2019 - 2020
Helping Indonesia’s Bintan Island Tackle the Threat of Oil Spills
Ani Suryanti
CSF Indonesia Fisheries Management Area Groundwork Analysis Fellow 2019-2020
A lecturer at Raja Ali Haji Maritime University in the Faculty of Marine Science and Fisheries, Ani Suryanti spent her time in CSF’s fellowship program assessing the impact of oil spills on the tourism economy on Bintan Island in Indonesia.
A one hour boat ride from Singapore, Bintan Island is one of Indonesia’s most popular ecotourism destinations. Ani’s research found that the Riau Islands are one of the biggest contributors to national revenue in the tourism sector, and at the center of the Riau Island’s tourism is Bintan Island. With a long coastline, pristine beaches, and rich marine biodiversity, Bintan Island offers a healthy ecosystem for both ecological and economic prosperity. However, being located in one of the busiest cargo ship channels in the world creates a challenge for the island.
Oil is one of the most polluting substances to coastal and marine ecosystems in the world and oil spills on the Bintan Island coastline have damaged the marine ecosystem and affected tourism activity, underscoring the need to investigate and address this problem thoroughly. Oil spills can make it difficult for tourism service providers to predict their revenue since they rely heavily on a pristine and clean environment to attract tourists from all around Indonesia.
In 2019, Bintan Island was struck 23 times with oil spills on the coastline. Ani’s research found the cumulative total losses to the five resorts on the island were around 150,000 USD, including cleanup expenses, room cancellations, and monitoring costs. These losses not only represent a reduction in current revenues but also threaten future Bintan Island tourism if the problem isn’t addressed adequately.
She presented her research in the provincial capital, Tanjung Pinang. The event was attended by about 30 participants from the provincial government, various institutions, academics, civil society, tourism-business owners, police, and NGOs. Ani’s research has provided some essential information and economic justification for government efforts in addressing one of the main issues threatening Bintan’s marine ecosystem and tourism.
Where are they now? Ani’s CSF training helped her attain a position at the Department of Social-Economy Fisheries and after attending CSF Indonesia’s Journal Writing Workshop, Suryanti successfully published her work in an international journal.
“I am honored and grateful for CSF. Hopefully my research will help to solve real-life problems within Fisheries Management Area 711 specifically, in the Riau Islands.”
About the Groundwork Analysis (GWA) Program
CSF’s GWA program is a capacity-building collaboration between CSF Indonesia (Yayasan Strategi Konservasi) and the Faculty of Fisheries and Marine Sciences of IPB University (FPIK). The goal of the course is to build the capacity and leadership of researchers and decision-makers in using economics and conservation science tools for the sustainable management of marine and fisheries resources. This work is made possible by the generous support of Margaret A. Cargill Philanthropies and the Walton Family Foundation.
Permana Ari Soejarwo
“I hope that this will lead Lampung to become a province that can sustain such disasters, and restore the South Lampung identity of marine tourism.”
Putu Liza Mustika
Wellem "Willy" Anselmus Teniwut
- 2022
Improving Sustainable Fishing Practices with a Certification Program
Fish market at Panarukan Harbor in East Java, Indonesia.
ShutterstockCindy Silvia Hadi
Aquaculture and Fisheries Auditor
CSF Course: Marine Fellowship ProgramSustainable fishing practices are a growing global concern, the impacts of which affect all marine life across the globe and fishing industries. As an archipelago, Indonesia has an incredible potential to be a leader in sustainable fishing practices, with enough marine life to provide the country with an abundance of seafood, however, though blessed with the coral triangle and its marine biodiversity, Indonesia fishery practices are still far from sustainable.
Seafood certification is one of the best ways for governing bodies to monitor the sustainability of their region’s fishing practices, though it comes with its own challenges.Our Marine Fellow Cindy Silvia Hadi is a fishery and auditor at the Control Union Indonesia. She is working to improve sustainability in the seafood industry by investigating the impact of certification processes on fishing practices. Seafood certification programs are being put in place across the country, but how effective are they in managing and improving fishing practices?
Cindy’s research on certifications in Bitung, North Sulawesi, and Buru Island, Maluku will assess whether or not the region’s seafood certification programs have resulted in positive outcomes for both the fishermen and the local economy. This research will build a strategic framework for future analyses of seafood certification programs and will help the conservation world more effectively implement sustainable practices in the fishing industry.
Cindy Silvia Hadi
“I truly believe that I have received one, if not the best piece of schooling since my university days in the UK. My way of appreciating the excellent, multi-cultural training we received is to use it, and sure like rain we are using it!”
“Conservation Strategy Fund’s programs define what is cutting-edge in the conservation field. A precious gem whose approaches must be scaled-up by every major conservation organization.”
“The CSF program connects both sides – people and nature – and taught me ways to do conservation better with economic tools. And, for the first time, I enjoy numbers!”
