Evidence-Based Conservation, synthesizing data into a single body of evidence on issues of greatest concern to conservation managers

The Centre for Evidence-Based Conservation was established in 2003. Our goal is to support decision making through the provision of evidence on the impact of human activity on nature and the impact of conservation management and policy interventions. Our vision is to build a library of systematic reviews of available evidence. Systematic review is a formal methodology, developed in the fields of medicine and public health, to synthesise available evidence on effectiveness of both clinical and management interventions. The product is aimed at decision-makers in recognition of the fact that they do not have time to access and review the evidence themselves. The scientific rigour of the methodology ensures objectivity, independence and repeatability through transparent reporting. The impact on medicine has been termed ‘revolutionary’. This talk will summarize the progress of evidence-based conservation thus far and set out the steps toward the next phase in its development. Early work has focussed on the challenges of firstly, identifying the appropriate questions for review, then capturing, extracting and synthesizing ecological evidence of varying quality, and finally, communicating uncertainty in review outcome. The next phase involves the ‘mainstreaming’ of systematic reviews into the culture of the scientific, management and funding communities to stimulate productive collaboration. For the library to address issues of greatest concern to conservation managers, significant knowledge dialogue and commitment from the scientific and funding communities are required, but evidence from medicine suggests the potential rewards are high.