Scaling a global plan into regional strategies for amphibian conservation

In 2005, the Species Survival Commission (SSC) of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and Conservation International (CI) convened the Amphibian Conservation Summit to design a global plan of action, the Amphibian Conservation Action Plan (ACAP), to address the decline of amphibian populations worldwide. The IUCN SSC Amphibian Specialist Group (ASG) was formed in 2006 to implement the ACAP. The ASG's objectives are to facilitate the development of new policies within national and international arenas, as well as within the private sector, and to actively develop projects, locally and regionally, all aimed at preventing further species extinctions. The ACAP provides an estimate of the budget required for actions needed to address global priorities for conservation. A strategy and budget for priorities ensures that actions align with areas, geographic and thematic, in greatest need. A critical next step towards advancing the ACAP is refining its objectives within the context of national and regional strategies and engagement by national resource management agencies and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) for successful implementation of conservation actions. To this end, the ASG and partners have been facilitating the convening of working groups to develop strategies for advancing policy development to enable implementation of on-the-ground conservation management within specific regions and countries. A review of strategies in development and completed indicates that conservation planning at the scale of nations and regions is an important step toward reconciling some debates on what actions are of highest priority for global amphibian conservation and illustrates how priorities vary geographically. However, successful translation of scientifically based strategic plans into conservation action in the field has not occurred widely, partly due to a lack of follow up in engaging governments and NGOs to incorporate the plans into their directives. Continued pressure on governments and NGOs is needed to use species assessments as the metric for determining the status of the environment, and amphibian conservation plans as one of the roadmaps for how funding should be allocated to maintain and improve the health of natural ecosystems.