May 2020, ScientificAmerican.com 63These tools help local peoples manage resources by collecting data,
monitoring changes and challenges, determining how to respond
to them and partnering with outsiders to achieve their goals.
Using these devices, the Ju/’hoan San in Namibia are document-
ing illegal cattle drives by their non-San neighbors to water holes
in their conservancy, which are used by the wild animals they hunt,
while also keeping tabs on their populations. In Kenya, the Maasai
in the Maasai Mara worry about the increasing scarcity of the wild
medicinal plants they use. In an effort to understand what was
damaging them, they documented 123 species of medicinal plants,
52 percent of which were healthy and unharmed. It turned out that
burgeoning numbers of tourist camps were responsible for much
of the damage to the rest. The Maasai are now expanding the proj-
ect to the Mau Forest Complex. Best of all, a group from the Uni-
versity of Copenhagen worked with the Prey Lang community in
Cambodia to stop illegal logging. Communicating via mobile
phones, volunteers track illegal loggers, descending on them en
masse, photographing and geotagging their activities with Sapelli
and confiscating their chain saws. With support from local admin-
istrators, they were able to stop all unauthorized logging.
These efforts rest on the reality that many parts of the world
are rich in biodiversity because of the communities that have been
living in them for hundreds or thousands of years, not in spite of
them. Local peoples are also the most ardent defenders of the envi-
ronment—because they have the most to lose when it is degraded.
When I last visited the Congo, in December 2019, Emeka gave
me a message to convey to Scientific American’s readers: “We are
the forest’s guardians. We have always been here, taking care of the
forest. Since time began we have killed animals, and they have
always been there for us. We kill animals to feed our children. We
don’t farm! We don’t fish! But now the eco-guards stop us; they
have forbidden us our forest .... We want our children not to have
to go far to find animals—just close to where we stay, as it was
before, when we cared for the forest. But our world has been
spoiled. It’s a big problem. We want to be well. Sort this out, peo-
ple, so that we can know joy again!”MORE TO EXPLORE
Managing Abundance, Not Chasing Scarcity: The Real Challenge for the 21st Century.
Jerome Lewis in Radical Anthropology, Vol. 6, No. 2, pages 11–19; 2008.
The Anthropology of Sustainability: Beyond Development and Progress.
Edited by Marc Brightman and Jerome Lewis. Palgrave, 2017.
Flourishing Diversity: Learning from Indigenous Wisdom Traditions.
Jerome Lewis. Flourishing Diversity Series, 2019. http://www.flourishingdiversity.com/report
Cornered by PAs: Adopting Rights-Based Approaches to Enable Cost-Effective
Conservation and Climate Action. Vicky Tauli-Corpuz et al. in World Development,
Vol. 130, Article No. 104923; June 2020.
FROM OUR ARCHIVES
Sacred Groves. Madhav Gadgil; December 2018.
scientificamerican.com/magazine/saSAWN TIMBER and logs stacked ( 1 ) for floating down the
Sangha River near Pokola, a logging town, in 2019. Elsewhere,
a timber-laden truck ( 2 ) awaits a ferry to cross the Sangha.
The Congo forests export hardwoods around the world.
2