Chapter 4 Flashcards
Adaptive Management
Adaptive environmental management A structured, systematic approach to environmental management that treats policy and management interventions as deliberate experiments to test hypotheses and monitor and evaluate the outcomes in order to refine policies and actions as new knowledge and understanding are gained.
The Adaptive Management Cycle
- Problem Assessment
- Monitoring and Assessment (i)
- Designing policy or Management options or experiments
- Implementation
- Monitoring and Assessment (ii)
- Evaluation
- Adjustment
- Monitoring and assessment (iii)
The Adaptive Management Cycle (AMC)
- Problem Assessment
- Monitoring and Assessment (i)
- Designing policy or Management options or experiments
- Implementation
- Monitoring and Assessment (ii)
- Evaluation
- Adjustment
- Monitoring and assessment (iii)
Problem Assessment (AMC)
- framing the problem
- identifying measurable objectives and potential management actions
- defining hypotheses concerning management actions
- establishing indicators to explore the potential effects of management actions defining the scope of the management issue
- identifying and assessing initial gaps in understanding.
Based on collaborative processes and interactions among managers, scientists and local resource users or communities.
Monitoring and Assessment (i)
- identifying key system variables
- assessing system dynamics in absence of any policy or management experiment
Three Basic Models of Adaptive management
Evolutionary
Passive
Active
Example of successful active adaptive management
The Mantioba sharp-tailed grouse management program.
Example of successful active adaptive management
The Manitoba sharp-tailed grouse management program.
Evolutionary Adaptive Management
Characterized by undirected learning from random experience, or trial-and-error management.
This is ‘managing adaptively’ rather than adaptive management.
—i.e., if the proposed technique does not work, we will try something else
Passive Adaptive Management
An approach to adaptive management whereby a single management policy or prescription (i.e., experiment) that managers think is “best” is implemented and then monitored and adjusted accordingly as new knowledge is gained through the monitoring process.
- Historically informed “best practice”is used to frame a single best approach
- policy or managment prescription and policy/management objectives are adjusted as new knowledge is gained through monitoring.
Example of Evolutionary Adaptive Management
Diavik Diamond Mine’s water monitoring and management program
“Managing adaptively” vs. Adaptive Environmental Management
Adaptive management is more than just monitoring and responding.
Managing adaptively is best characterized as undirected learning from experience, or trial-and-error management .
—i.e., if the proposed technique does not work, we will try something else.
Active Adaptive Environmental Management
An approach to adaptive management that involves active experimentation, whereby the environmental system is intentionally disturbed under controlled conditions to test alternate hypotheses, monitor, and learn from a range of policy and management interventions.
Adaptive Capacity
The ability of individuals, groups, or systems to cope with change and/or disturbance and learn through uncertainty.
Limits to passive adaptive environmental management
often difficult under passive adaptive management, when a single manage- ment experiment is implemented, to determine whether the observed changes are due to the management treatment or to external factors.
the results of passive management experiments often are uncertain when dealing with complex ecological systems and that the rate of learning can be slow
