YUS Conservation Area
Woodland Park Zoo
Building an Endowment for Sustainable Community Protected Area Management
Financial sustainability is an overarching aim for YUS landscape management. Woodland Park Zoo, with the help of Conservation International’s Global Conservation Fund and other donors, established a two million dollar endowment for the Tree Kangaroo Conservation Program and the YUS Conservation Area in 2011. The non-sinking endowment is managed by Woodland Park Zoo (WPZ) and follows procedures outlined in WPZ’s Operations Manual. Four percent of the interest earned by the endowment is to be disbursed annually by WPZ in accordance with TKCP-PNG annual plans and budget formulated in December of each year, and is designed to provide partial funding for core landscape programs in perpetuity.
- Partnership with organization that has expertise in establishing protected area endowments.
- Long-term institutional support for endowment fund management (Woodland Park Zoo).
- It is important to link the allocation of endowment funds to clear outcomes in TKCP-PNG annual plans, and to the long-term targets of the YUS Landscape Plan.
- It is necessary to continue to attract additional funding streams for the rest of the core programs, non-core programs, and operational costs not covered by the endowment fund disbursements (WPZ and TKCP continue to submit funding proposals to donors for this purpose).