Conservation Management: The Data Model

 

Technically, a CMS is a project-based planning and recording system aimed at managing conservation features within acceptable limits of variation. A feature is any component of the environment that has to be managed e.g. a footpath or a species. A 'project' is simply a programme of work leading to an output e.g. 'construct a footpath', 'patrol an area' or 'record a species'.

Projects are work plans that control specific factors that help or impede the attainment of management objectives. Each project includes a description of a process, e.g. the work to be done, when and where it is to be done and the inputs of resources required.

When a project is completed, what was actually done is recorded. This is an output.

The outcome of a CMS is the state of the feature at the end of the project and is measured by performance indicators.

Performance indicators are quantitative or qualitative attributes of the features e.g. numbers of a species, and they are measured by special monitoring-projects in order to gauge success in reaching the management objectives.

Copies of all projects with their inputs, outputs and outcomes are retained in the CMS to provide a progress- register, and an archive to support managerial continuity.

In summary, the prime function of a CMS is to enable conservation managers to control the operational functions of a management plan as a feedback system or work-cycle by:

  • identifying and describing, in a standard way, all the tasks required to control the key factors (positive or negative), which influence the condition of the features, and thereby maintain the features in a favourable condition;
  • producing and budgeting various work programmes to control the factors, for example, five-year plans, rolling- plans, annual schedules, financial schedules, and work schedules for specified categories of staff;
  • providing a site/species monitoring system to check the effectiveness of the plan against the specified objectives;
  • facilitating the exchange of management information by reporting, within, and between, sites and organisations;
  • using feedback from monitoring to improve the management system.

The sequence of identifying features, setting objectives, and then selecting the factors to be controlled by projects with scheduled work plans, comprises a management plan.

The most effective way of organising a CMS is to assemble it as a set of interlinked forms as a relational database. However, it is also possible to operate a management plan with a spread sheet or a collection of hyperlinked 'to-do' lists.


http://www.biodiversity.ecoworld.co.uk/cwicnet/


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