Sarhad Provincial Conservation Strategy - IUCN
Sarhad Provincial Conservation Strategy - IUCN
Sarhad Provincial Conservation Strategy - IUCN
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18<br />
A S S E S S I N G P R O G R E S S T O W A R D S S U S T A I N A B I L I T Y<br />
It is possible to confuse the process of monitoring<br />
the implementation of the <strong>Sarhad</strong> <strong>Provincial</strong><br />
<strong>Conservation</strong> <strong>Strategy</strong> with the process of achieving<br />
sustainability. Implementation does not necessarily<br />
mean having the desired effect. It is essential that<br />
basic mechanisms be established to monitor each<br />
objective in each priority area. Hence an implementation<br />
plan will be established for each. The plans<br />
will include objectives, sub-objectives, outputs, activities,<br />
and results.<br />
These work plans then become the principal management<br />
tools, not only to report results on a sixmonthly<br />
basis, but to allow more frequent monitoring,<br />
concurrent critiques, a reassessment of priorities, and<br />
inevitable crisis management. They can also serve as<br />
the basis for employees evaluation, budget control,<br />
and ultimately the design of the subsequent versions<br />
of the SPCS.<br />
The work plan for SPCS 1995-98 will be developed<br />
while the strategy itself is being designed, printed,<br />
and published during 1996.<br />
1 8 . 1<br />
FEEDBACK MECHANISMS<br />
Several useful mechanisms exist to monitor the strategy<br />
and to assess progress towards achieving sustainability.<br />
Copies of the regular monitoring reports<br />
prepared by field projects for submission to<br />
Government and donors two to four times a year<br />
will be obtained and analyzed in the Planning,<br />
Environment and Development (PE&D) Department.<br />
Second, the focal points in key sectors, which will<br />
be networked with the PE&D Department, will provide<br />
monitoring information for their respective sectors. This<br />
will be essentially qualitative information, especially<br />
with respect to those aspects of the SPCS that are not<br />
translated into field projects. These include legislation,<br />
policy development, and capacity building.<br />
Third, the PE&D Department will commission its<br />
own periodic surveys to gather quantitative and qualitative<br />
information about the efficiency and relevance<br />
of the recommended actions and about the progress<br />
towards sustainable development.<br />
This information will be pooled and analyzed in<br />
the PE&D Department. To this end, monitoring capac-<br />
232 SARHAD PROVINCIAL CONSERVATION STRATEGY<br />
ity will be created in the Department both in terms of<br />
quality personnel and fiscal resources. The monitoring<br />
data will be collected and translated into proposals<br />
for adjustment in the strategic planning and the<br />
approach to implementation. The Executive<br />
Committee for the <strong>Provincial</strong> Environment Protection<br />
Council will consider and approve the proposals as<br />
necessary.<br />
1 8 . 2<br />
ACHIEVING SUSTA I N A B I L I T Y<br />
<strong>IUCN</strong> has defined a strategy as “an evolutionary<br />
process, developing as it goes along adapting to<br />
change. It is also recycled, its main components—<br />
constituency building, agenda building, design implementation,<br />
assessment—being repeated as it develops”<br />
(<strong>IUCN</strong>, 1994).<br />
With support from the International Development<br />
Research Centre (IDRC) and the Canadian<br />
International Development Agency (CIDA), <strong>IUCN</strong><br />
has been considering how to assess progress<br />
towards sustainability. Although it is work in<br />
progress, it does provide a conceptual basis for<br />
looking at sustainability.<br />
Human well-being and ecosystem well-being are<br />
equally important, because people are an integral<br />
part of the ecosystem and the well-being of one is<br />
bound up in the well-being of the other. Sustainable<br />
well-being is the combination of human and ecosystem<br />
well-being. A society is sustainable only if both<br />
the human condition and the condition of the ecosystem<br />
are satisfactory or improving. If either is unsatisfactory<br />
or worsening, the society is unsustainable<br />
(<strong>IUCN</strong>, 1994).<br />
The ‘barometer’ of sustainability proposed by<br />
<strong>IUCN</strong> and IDRC produces a single word index of<br />
progress rather than an elaborate numerical scheme<br />
that requires large amounts of information to be collected.<br />
This is a particularly useful concept for the<br />
North West Frontier Province, where many basic<br />
data are not available and where resource limitations<br />
prevent certain kinds of information from being collected.<br />
Table 18.1 presents the potential qualitative<br />
results from an assessment of ecosystem condition<br />
and human condition.