Introducing South Africa’s first biodiversity tax incentive required the support and assistance of a very effective and cohesive community of practice within South Africa’s national biodiversity stewardship initiative. The tax incentives relate directly to South Africa's protected areas declared on private or communally owned land. This context required the support of the implementers of these types of protected area declarations to facilitate this unique biodiversity finance solution. The implementers of biodiversity stewardship in South Africa range from representatives of national and provincial government, NGOs, and various experts and specialists. They work together in a collaborative community of practice which provided its full support to the tax incentive work. The novelty of the tax work, as well as the numerous components of the Project that required simultaneous success, required the direct support, advice and assistance of the community of practice. This support facilitated Building Blocks 1 and 2 and ensured that the Project deliverables could be achieved in the most conducive environment possible.

The Project launched a number of pilot sites across the country to test the use and applicability of biodiversity tax incentives in different contexts. The pilot sites enabled the Project to engage with the people directly impacted by the tax benefits. The pilot sites covered parastatals, international companies, communities, and individual farmers undertaking different commercial activities. The sites also covered different biomes and biodiversity priority areas. This grassroots engagement was a crucial building block as it took the policy engagement of the Project, as well as the achievement of amending national legislation, and practically tested its impact on the ground. To determine what impact the tax incentives would have on landowners declaring protected areas, landowners themselves needed to be engaged deliberately. This grassroots engagement effectively illustrated the financial and tangible benefits of the incentive. These pilot sites also showed that the new biodiversity tax incentive was applicable to all types of legal entities in South Africa and could be applied to a varied array of commercial and private enterprises and activities.  It effectively applied the tax impact to landowners and showed that it was successful and replicable.

The Jalca's Participatory Management Plan (PMP) is a document that was developed with the participation of leaders, authorities and community members, which establishes the programmatic and action framework to achieve management objectives in the short, medium and long term (10 years). The PMP reflects the main needs of the communities in terms of threats, analyzed with the communities in order to minimize these threats together. The active participation of both men and women, as well as people from all generations of the community, was sought in its preparation. The plan consists of 5 components that allow planning, in a collective analysis, actions for the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity and water. These components take into account the socio-environmental problems and threats identified in the socio-ecological diagnosis and in the prioritization of threats for this micro-watershed, including both local anthropic pressures and the adverse effects of climate change. Its purpose is to promote a process of social change, management and implementation of sustainable alternatives for the conservation of the Jalca. The PMP becomes a dynamic instrument for the management and sustainable management of the Jalca at the community level.

Participatory Action Research (PAR) refers to research based on three pillars: (i) Research: belief in the value and power of knowledge and respect for its different expressions and ways of producing it; (ii) Participation: emphasizing democratic values and the right of people to control their own situations and stressing the importance of a horizontal relationship between the community involved and external organizations; and (iii) Action: a change that improves the community's situation. More than the methodology or techniques used, what distinguishes PRA from other ways of doing research is the commitment to social change and the express search to collaborate with the empowerment of vulnerable groups so that they can decide and manage their own change. The CIAL, with support from the Mountain Institute and the National University of Ancash Santiago Antúnez de Mayolo, carried out a PRA on water quality between 2010 and 2013 that included dialogue of knowledge between local researchers and external specialists, training to measure water quality with field teams that evaluate parameters (PH, conductivity, acidity, dissolved oxygen, and others), and the identification and implementation of the bioremediation solution.

The success of introducing South Africa's first biodiversity tax incentive into the protected areas network began with the amendment of South Africa's Income Tax Act. Without the tax incentive being lodged into national fiscal legislation, the solution would never have been possible. This first successful step required the building block of: National Policy Engagement. Amending the Income Tax Act required deliberate engagement with key national ministries and departments, primarily: the Department of Environmental Affairs and the Ministry of Finance. Institutional support was provided by the Department of Environmental Affairs and the department endorsed the tax work at a national level. This allowed for direct engagement with key environmental fiscal policy makers within South Africa's National Treasury. This engagement was direct, open, collaborative and positive, and allowed for the formulation of South Africa's first tax deduction aimed at supporting and benefitting taxpayers formally protecting South Africa's natural heritage in the public interest. 

Ecologically, diversity allows for a balanced ecosystem where different species help to accelerate or inhibit the growth of one another. Socially, diversity allows for integrative consideration and equal participation in a public food forest. In either setting, diversity creates conflicts and a dynamic equilibrium to make sure that no species or a specific group of people occupy all the benefits by excluding the others.

Diversity may be in terms of sex, age, race, occupation, financial status and many more. As the Beacon Food Forest is located on a public land in Seattle, one of the most culturally diverse cities in the United States, we are advised by the City government at the initial stage of the project to showcase our design map of the Beacon Food Forest in communities of different cultures. It was a necessary step to gain diverse support and proof that this project is not only in the interest of one group but many different groups of people. By valuing these diverse cultures, we ended up getting vast emails of interest and even seeds and plants that are unique to these people’s homeland (foreign but not invasive), and of course the City government’s approval to proceed the project.

A successful solution requires a strong community where all are given enough knowledge (aka. power) and trust to fully engage themselves. Beacon Food Forest is co-founded by two local residents but the active engagement from the wider community is the true reason why it is still growing and prospering after 6 years. Hence, building a strong community that is empowered with knowledge, skills, and trust is the key for the Beacon Food Forest to sustain.

Community empowerment allows each individual in the community to acquire knowledge and skills needed to participate in the decision-making process of Beacon Food Forest. By providing educational opportunities and by offering leadership opportunities whenever possible (e.g. during workshops, work parties, maintenance events, discussions, and meetings), we allow participants to gain confidence and trust, and then develop a passion and a sense of responsibility towards the land and people which Beacon Food Forest stewards. It is so essential that we do this because for any solution to be carried on, the solution has to be something in which everyone can and is willing to engage themselves in.

An essential factor in the integration of key aspects of climate change and biodiversity into territorial planning at the municipal level was the strengthening of local capacities in territorial planning, ecosystem services and adaptation to climate change. This was done at the level of municipal administrations, personnel from Colombia's National Natural Parks and protected areas, and local communities. Equally important was knowledge management to provide inputs that facilitate the development of public policy proposals in this area. Such is the case of the preparation of diagnoses of the Basic Land Management Plans in the two municipalities, to analyze the degree of inclusion of PAs and generate recommendations for greater integration; the preparation of diagnoses and identification of ecosystem services, to make visible the importance of PAs in territorial development and in the quality of life of the surrounding population; and the identification of risks associated with climate change and adaptation strategies, based on local experiences, in order to contribute to the resilience of ecosystems in the context of land use planning.

In compliance with the goals established in the National Parks System's Institutional Action Plan and the SNAP Action Plan, Parks began the process of integrating PAs into national, regional and local technical instruments and public policy. With the issuance of Colombia's Organic Law of Territorial Planning by the Congress of the Republic and the creation of the Territorial Planning Commission (COT), made up of seven institutions, including the National Planning Department, which serves as Technical Secretary, the process of forming the Special Interinstitutional Committee (CEI) of the COT began. National Parks was included as one of the 6 institutions permanently invited to participate in the CEI, due to its efforts in public policy, the preparation of technical documents, and the development of 8 pilot cases in different regions of the country, with the aim of providing inputs for the formulation of the General Land Use Planning Policy, from a multilevel, interinstitutional and participatory approach. IUCN-South America proposes to be part of this national process by supporting the implementation of 2 of the pilot cases through the global project "Integrated Land Use Planning for Biodiversity".

The current habitat mapping layer is a source of information regarding the up-to-date distribution and quality of habitats all over the Czech Republic. 

More information is available in the English summary of the publication at the following link: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/47048702_Mapovani_biotopu_v_Ceske_republice_vychodiska_vysledky_perspektivy