percent had specialized secondary work or some college work (through
adult education).^56In summary observations, the authors suggest that staff capacity was greatest
in areas of financial and human resource management. Staff capacity was least
satisfactory in areas such as ecosystem, habitat and species management,
project development and management, and technology and information
management, areas related to the prime function of nature reserves.^57
Much attention has focused on the development of management capacity in
China’s nature reserves of late, involving foreign funding agencies and
international ENGOs such as CI, WWF, and TNC. In addition, at least five
colleges/universities in China have developed specialized degree programs in
the management of nature reserves, such as at Beijing Forestry University and
Northeast Forestry University. Were funding increased to make the jobs
attractive and were capacity-building efforts to continue, one could be less
pessimistic about the prospects for enhancing the ability of those working in
nature reserves.
Community Conflicts
Pressures of local communities – for access to land and resources of nature
reserves, for participation in decisions of PA authorities directly affecting
their lives, and for recognition of the value of their local culture – contribute
most of the tension to the development and management of conservation
units.
First and uppermost is the contradiction between seeking to alleviate
poverty and improving the environment for endangered species and
ecosystems. In general, China’s richer areas (primarily those along the east
coast) have allocated more resources to species conservation with greater
success. In China’s poorer regions, where most of the threatened endemic
species are located, preservation efforts conflict with provincial and local
attempts to foster development, and with attempts of poor people to survive.^58
A study by investigators for the SFA reported on a typical village in the
Jianfengling nature reserve of Hainan Province:
‘[T]he administrative village including Miao and Li nationality natural villages, has
69 households with the population sum of 362, who are all poor. In this area, the
average income per capita only is RMB $300 (US$37), more than 60 percent of
which comes from collection of forestry and sideline products, hunting, grazing,
40 percent of which comes from rice, peanuts, planting cassava and raising pigs,
cattle, and sheep. In this village roads have been paved but electricity isn’t current,
and using water is very difficult. There only are teaching stations for first and
second grade primary school pupils in this village.’^59Protected areas and biodiversity conservation 115