Publications
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Money is at the heart of environmental crimes that exploit wildlife, forests, fisheries or other natural resources. These transnational crimes generate significant profits, estimated at USD 7-23 billion annually for wildlife crime alone, and are mostly “serious, organized crime on an industrial scale driven by the profit motive”. Wildlife traffickers rely heavily on bribery of officials, including rangers, customs, agents, prosecutors, and judges, as well as complex fraud and tax evasion.
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This content is made possible by the generous support of the American people through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The contents are the responsibility of World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and do not necessarily reflect the views of USAID, the United States Government, or individual TNRC consortium members.
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The case study programs highlighted in this report in Nepal, Vietnam, and Uganda all indicate that meaningful citizen participation and multi-stakeholder collaboration can contribute to local and national NRM governance systems with the potential for sustainably reducing corruption.
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This content is made possible by the generous support of the American people through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The contents are the responsibility of World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and do not necessarily reflect the views of USAID, the United States Government, or individual TNRC consortium members.
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Equitable sharing of the benefits of conservation is essential to successful conservation efforts and sustainable use of natural resources. Effective benefit sharing, facilitated by transparent and informed decision-making, can help build community partnerships and support for conservation, facilitate law enforcement, and prevent conflicts and corruption. Recent changes in Kenya’s legal frameworks for managing wildlife and forests have reformed benefit sharing between state or private investors and local communities. Conservation interventions increasingly build on the opportunities provided by these institutional and legal reforms.
However, benefit sharing requirements have been weakened by gaps in implementation and gazettement of required regulations and guidelines. Coupled with weak enforcement of local accountability mechanisms, these gaps provide opportunities for corruption, including diversion of conservation funds for private use, systemic bribery, and rent seeking in wildlife and forestry contracts. A range of coordinated anti-corruption strategies must therefore be included when closing these institutional and regulatory gaps. Technological solutions may help. For example, integrated revenue systems could promote information transparency and accountability in revenue collection and use.
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This content is made possible by the generous support of the American people through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The contents are the responsibility of World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and do not necessarily reflect the views of USAID, the United States Government, or individual TNRC consortium members.
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This report reviews the evidence of impacts that transportation infrastructure growth is having on Asian elephant populations and presents guidelines, policies, laws, practices, and emerging technologies that could reduce the risks. It also provides examples of proven mitigation measures currently being implemented in various Asian elephant range states.
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Transparent 2021 is the latest annual report from ReSource: Plastic examining where and how its Member companies have made progress on plastic waste mitigation.
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The Building Material Selection and Use: An Environmental Guide provides guidance on environmentally responsible selection, sourcing, use and disposal of building material. It also outlines the potential environmental and social impacts of different building materials throughout their life cycle. The guide is designed for government agencies, private sector companies, NGOs, and community-based organizations engaged in building construction and post-disaster reconstruction.
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Beneficial ownership transparency (BOT) aims to uncover the identity of “beneficial owners” who ultimately control assets. BOT allows law enforcement and the public to track bad actors’ connections to other businesses and hold them accountable for any corruption, illegal activities, or illicit fund transfers. For the natural resource management (NRM) sector, progress in BOT could play a significant role in deterring corruption, particularly corruption that can infiltrate resource supply chains.
Regulations around BOT are changing quickly, with dozens of countries enacting important rules to combat corruption and illicit money and trade in just the last few years. Even though many loopholes remain, it is important for NRM practitioners to understand the beneficial ownership rules at the sites where they are working and make use of BOT where possible to safeguard programs from natural resource crime and associated corruption.
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This content is made possible by the generous support of the American people through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The contents are the responsibility of World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and do not necessarily reflect the views of USAID, the United States Government, or individual TNRC consortium members.
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Complex corporate structures, while legal, and jurisdictions that allow or encourage the use of such mechanisms such as flags of convenience and financial secrecy jurisdictions, obscure the identity of beneficial owners in the fisheries sector. The lack of transparency, oversight, standardized rules, and enforcement around beneficial ownership facilitates corruption and complicates efforts to combat IUU fishing.
Large-scale reforms are needed to regulate the use of complex company structures, improve transparency of ultimate beneficial owners, and prevent the exploitation of opaque jurisdictions and flag states that facilitate illegal fishing and associated crimes.
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This content is made possible by the generous support of the American people through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The contents are the responsibility of World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and do not necessarily reflect the views of USAID, the United States Government, or individual TNRC consortium members.
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Corruption early in the infrastructure lifecycle creates cascading negative effects and significant conservation impacts. Within infrastructure, the conservation impacts of grand corruption are greater than those of petty corruption. Anti-corruption strategies to increase integrity, transparency, and accountability can reduce these impacts but require complementary advocacy efforts and direct action.
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This content is made possible by the generous support of the American people through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The contents are the responsibility of World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and do not necessarily reflect the views of USAID, the United States Government, or individual TNRC consortium members.
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Restorative aquaculture may be one of the best opportunities to simultaneously improve the health of aquatic environments and provide food for a growing population. The Global Principles of Restorative Aquaculture report establishes a clear definition of restorative aquaculture and provides clarity on how this approach can be effectively implemented and fostered. The report is a collaborative effort with co-authors from 12 highly regarded global universities, government, non-profits, and financial institutions.
The Nature Conservancy. 2021. Global Principles of Restorative Aquaculture. Arlington, VA.
