by Marc Hockings, University of Queensland, Peter Stathis, NSW Department of Environment and Conservation and R.W. (Bill) Carter, University of Queensland
Wollemi National Park, New South Wales © Shane Ruming
Australia has a federal system of government in which the primary responsibility for land and conservation management lies with State Governments. Hence the vast majority of National Parks and other conservation reserves are managed by authorities at the State level. The New South Wales National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) is responsible for management of over 650 protected areas within that state totalling almost 6 million hectares.
New South Wales produced its first State of the Parks report in 2001.79 This report was primarily an introduction to the NPWS and to its goals for the park system. It contained descriptive information about the parks, their values and the pressures they face but did not include a structured or comprehensive assessment of the conservation status of the parks or the effectiveness of management. In late 2003, the NPWS embarked on a process to prepare a new State of the Parks report that would provide a stronger focus on assessing and reporting performance in park management. At the same time as this initiative was commencing, the NSW Auditor-General was conducting a performance audit of the Service.80 This audit concluded that: “the Service has yet to:
clarify what constitutes success in reserve management
develop an adequate information base to measure its success.
Consequently the Service cannot reliably determine how well it conserves and protects our natural and cultural heritage. This is a common situation for like agencies… To support continuous improvement and accountability, we recommend the Service:
establish specific objectives and priorities for reserve management
implement a comprehensive system to measure and evaluate its results.
We note the Service has major initiatives in train to this end and recommend these be given high priority.”
Objectives established for the State of the Parks system are to:
inform planning and decision-making at all levels, based on a “learning by doing” or adaptive management approach;
provide information on how well NPWS is achieving its objectives;
create clear and systematic links between management objectives and outcomes;
better allocate funds and resources; and
promote effective communication of management performance to communities.
It was recognised that such a system would also benefit staff by providing greater clarity about expectations of management and greater certainty about the availability of resources, hence making their job easier.
Information for the State of the Parks report was collected in two primary ways. Qualitative information was collected via a staff-based assessment system. This assessment was developed using the WCPA Framework. The assessment instrument collected information on reserve values, threats to those values and the status of planning. It also identified and assessed the relationship between NPWS and stakeholders. Management performance was then scored in relation to 30 indicators of management effectiveness using a four point scale. These indicators covered all six elements of the WCPA Framework. Additionally, quantitative data was collected on a set of 15 indicators in a sample of 22 reserves.
The assessment instrument was created and refined in consultation with park managers to ensure it covered all relevant aspects of park management and would provide useful results to inform decision making. Draft versions were piloted during the development process to give park managers confidence in its adequacy in assessing management effectiveness. The survey was completed in early 2004 for all of the 639 parks (all the parks gazetted as at 30 June 2003) by field staff with an excellent understanding of the on-ground management of those parks. Where objective information was available it was used by park managers in completing the survey. However, in the absence of these data, staff were required to make subjective assessments of park management based on strict assessment criteria.
To ensure that these data were comparable across the state, verification methods were built into the data collection process. Before the assessment was undertaken, workshops were held across the state to train staff in the system. To further assist park managers in completing the assessment, detailed explanatory guidelines were provided. To ensure that there was consistency in the responses to the assessment, all 639 parks were internally verified by the relevant area and regional managers who looked for consistency in assessment across the range of parks for which they were responsible. Managers were permitted to adjust field staff assessments if they provided a clear justification and discussed their proposed changes with the relevant staff members. This process was designed to minimize inconsistencies that arose due to the different perceptions of individuals. Staff were also encouraged to complete the assessment in groups, again to reduce potential inconsistencies associated with individual opinions.
Following an initial data collation period, in mid 2004 the survey data underwent a comprehensive, two-stage audit by a team of independent representatives from the NPWS Audit and Compliance Committee. The aim of the audit was to verify that the process used in developing the assessment followed accepted principles and was designed to capture appropriate data for determining the condition and management of the NSW park system. The first stage involved an investigation of the development of the system, and the collection and analysis of the associated data. The assessment responses for a sample of 30 parks (five per cent) were then examined in detail by NPWS staff with excellent knowledge of the parks but who had not participated in the data collection. The responses were scrutinised for both accuracy and reliability. Further validation of a small number of survey responses was carried out at a series of regional workshops to discuss the success of the first survey. This involved a detailed interview with the staff member who completed the assessment, their area manager and their regional manager. These staff were asked to describe their rationale for the different responses to ensure they had correctly interpreted the question and provided adequate justification for their responses. The conclusion of the audit process was that while there were some differences in the way in which staff completed the assessments, the consistency of the responses was adequately robust when considered at the statewide level. Finally, at the time of data analysis, the full data set was scanned for anomalies. Minor inconsistencies were identified and adjusted in consultation with ranger or manager staff.
Table 14. NPWS State of the Parks Report: Summary of Findings
The NSW NPWS State of the Parks Report was released in 2004.81 Some key findings from the State of the Parks report are summarised in Table 14.
The State of the Parks system is being used within the NPWS as a key element of a new park management framework, as explained by Peter Stathis, Manager of the Planning and Performance Unit in the box below.
Developing a park management framework
Peter Stathis, Manager Planning and Performance Unit, Department of Environment and Conservation (NSW NPWS)
The Park Management Framework used by NSW NPWS has been adapted from the IUCN Management Framework to meet the needs of the NSW park system (see Figure 15). The NPWS model reflects the administrative and operational structures and functions relevant to a government agency. Specifically, policy and monitoring and evaluation are included as components of the management cycle while the context for management comes from community values and expectations and environmental, political, social and ecological considerations.
To illustrate one of our changes, management objectives for a State government agency emanate from a variety of places – legislation, government policy and political commitments. These are strategic drivers with no detailed operational direction. The Park Policy component of the NSW Park Management Framework translates these strategic objectives into operational measures by considering the organizational context in which the objectives set by government are to be achieved.
To be successful, the NPWS Park Management Framework needs to be more than just a conceptual model: it also needs to be an operational guide, to help us organize our work and projects, label what we do and act as a diagnostic tool for identifying gaps in our park management systems.
To do this, NPWS is developing a Park Management Guide, available to all NPWS staff. The Guide is structured around key Park Management Framework elements, objectives, policy, planning, operations, monitoring and evaluation. Everything we do as a park management agency fits into these categories. Each of these chapters will contain comprehensive guidance and listing of all park management activities that will also be cross-referenced to other chapters in the guide where appropriate.
For example, a ranger looking for guidance on pest management will be able to pick up the guide, find the objective of our pest management strategies, any related policies and plans, operational guidance for specific pest species and the related monitoring and evaluation processes for determining the effectiveness of that pest programme, both at a site and state-wide levels. Importantly, this person can enter the guide at any point and still find all of the above references easily.
We have also defined our operational management activities to ensure that each element of the Park Management Framework is related to each major functional area of park management. We describe these major functional areas as our Service Themes. The Service Themes include Pest Animals, Weeds, Fire, Visitor Management, Cultural Heritage, General Infrastructure and Maintenance, Threatened Species, On and Off park ecological conservation.
Faced with the accountability requirement to publicly report on the State of the Parks, NPWS embarked on a whole-of-system assessment. Using the WCPA Framework and management effectiveness principles, a staff-based assessment was developed and implemented with extensive staff input into the design of the system. Minor adjustments to the assessment instrument are currently being made to ensure consistency in reporting, along with refining the processes of data acquisition and analysis. The methodology is considered to be sufficiently robust to provide an understandable overview of the status of parks, at least at the system and regional level. This has already been used to inform decision making at the highest levels within the organization. With each iteration of the assessment, it is expected that insights to trends at the area and park level will be increasingly evident to guide prioritization and planning of park activities. The process of evaluation, in itself, has also provided impetus to staff at all levels to review priorities and management action being applied, along with the cost of operational programmes. In addition, the subjective assessment has provided guidance to defining quantitative study of resource conditions and threats through identifying information gaps and thus helping to determine research needs.
Figure 15. The NSW Park Management Framework
The need for a robust and replicable method to measure on-park management effectiveness emerged when the NPWS was reviewing its whole system of management, reporting and decision making. The WCPA Framework galvanized these considerations to provide a core through which institutional management systems could be adjusted and linked.
While the State of the Parks process has met its principal objectives of being able to comprehensively report on park management at the whole-of-system level, its synergy with other management systems of the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service has been realized. All management systems are now moving towards synchronicity with an underlying framework, and the foundations of an adaptive management approach to field programmes is in place.
79NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service (2001). State of the Parks 2001: An overview of the conservation values of NSW and their management within the parks system. NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service, Sydney.
80NSW Audit Office (2004). Performance audit: managing natural and cultural heritage in parks and reserves: National Parks and Wildlife Service. The Audit Office of New South Wales, Sydney.
81Department of Environment and Conservation NSW (2004). State of the Parks 2004. Department of Environment and Conservation (NSW), Sydney.