Building long-term commitment by landholders to conservation of native vegetation: Characteristics of successful programs

Achieving practice change by private landholders on a scale sufficient to arrest the decline of native vegetation in Australia requires intervention by governments. Given the complex interaction of factors affecting landholder decision making, the heterogeneity of rural landholders, and the limited capacity of governments to invest directly in accomplishing policy objectives, it is not surprising that most researchers advocate a suite of policy options be employed. Our view is that too much attention has been focused on the short-term benefits and costs of different options and insufficient attention paid to the ability of different approaches to engender long-term commitment to outcomes that enhance native vegetation. Indeed, it is possible that consideration of long-term commitment might lead to a re-assessment of the value of different policy instruments. Even the very concept of 'long-term commitment' is poorly developed. In this paper we draw on a substantial review of relevant literature and our experience with natural resource management programs, including as evaluators of national programs, to:1. Articulate the rationale for such a study;2. Attempt to define 'long-term commitment'; and3. Identify a preliminary set of factors that would predict the success of programs in building long-term commitment by landholders to on-farm conservation.Our research, undertaken within the Landscape Logic research hub funded by the Commonwealth Environmental Research Facilities program (CERF), will continue throughout 2009 with a review of case studies to test our conceptualization of 'long-term commitment', and explore the extent that it is possible for NRM programs to build long-term commitment amongst landholders.