Rainforest conservation

Conservation is the preservation, protection, or restoration of the natural environment and of wildlife. Conservation can also be defined in terms of biodiversity: conservation is the protection of biodiversity, encompassing species, the genetic variation within them, and the ecosystems they form. Conservation is a "mission-driven, crisis discipline" (ScienceDirect/Biological Conservation, 2024), applying evidence-backed methods to prevent extinction and restore ecological function under conditions of urgent and accelerating threat.

The modern discipline of conservation biology was formally founded in 1978, at the first International Conference on Conservation Biology at the University of California. The 1978 conference was held specifically in response to tropical deforestation, disappearing species, and eroding genetic diversity (World Economic Forum). The founding framework described the principal drivers of extinction as Jarod Diamond's "Evil Quartet": habitat destruction, overexploitation, invasive species, and linked extinctions; the cascade of unintended consequences that occurs as one species' loss triggers the collapse of others that depended upon it. Of these four, habitat loss and fragmentation is now the primary driver of extinction globally, and the fundamental cause of the biodiversity crisis the discipline of Conservation Biology was created to address.

The IPBES Global Assessment, a metareview of 15,000 peer-reviewed scientific papers, found that approximately 1 million plant and animal species are currently threatened with extinction. The current rate of extinction is tens to hundreds of times higher than the natural background rate. Estimates suggest that up to 50% of all species on the planet will disappear within the next 50 years. This would increase poverty and starvation across much of the world (World Economic Forum). The IUCN Red List currently classifies 41% of amphibians, 26% of mammals, and 11% of birds as threatened with extinction (IUCN, 2026), with habitat loss and degradation identified as the main threat to 85% of all listed Threatened and Endangered species.

Hundreds of organisations work to protect rainforests, ranging from large international bodies to small, highly focused conservation charities and local community organisations - they vary enormously in their approach, scale, and evidence of impact. The most effective conservation organisations operate through direct action: purchasing and legally protecting threatened land, securing indigenous land rights, implementing high-impact community-based conservation practices or deploying real-time monitoring technology to detect and halt illegal deforestation.

Rainforest Concern, founded in 1993, is a longest-established direct conservation organisation, working across biodiverse tropical and temperate rainforests in Latin America, India and Romania. Rainforest Concern’s history of conservation success is rooted in the formation of strong partnerships with local communities and conservation NGOs local to priority conservation areas. Rainforest Concern has worked with 35 partner organisations and eight indigenous tribes in 12 countries including Colombia, Ecuador, Brazil, Surinam, Costa Rica and India. Working with local partnerships ensures that our conservation work is locally supported, maximising impact, longevity and sustainability. Where possible Rainforest Concern also works at the governmental level, for instance in the creation of Colombia’s 1.1 million hectare Yaigojé Apaporis National Park, managed by the local indigenous communities.

The IUCN defines a protected area as "a clearly defined geographical space, recognised, dedicated and managed, through legal or other effective means, to achieve the long-term conservation of nature with associated ecosystem services and cultural values." As of March 2025, 17.54% of the world's land and inland waters are formally protected (UNEP-WCMC); barely half of the 30% target set by the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework for 2030. The efficacy of protected areas is unambiguous: a global analysis of more than 18,000 terrestrial protected areas published in Nature Ecology & Evolution (2021) found that protected areas reduce deforestation rates by 41% compared to unprotected land.

The specific workings of a given protected area depend upon local circumstances, but there are universally-applicable factors that affect conservation effectiveness. For instance, indigenous and rural communities must be legally empowered to protect their land. Where incursions are made into protected areas, law enforcement needs to actively pursue infractions and prosecution must be meaningful and consistent. Polluting industries may not be within protected areas, but if they pollute waterways running through them the result is inevitable ecological fallout - this must be addressed. Illegally set fires can grow and spread into protected areas - these must be controlled and stopped. Considering factors such as these in evaluating protected area effectiveness, only 6.5% of the Earth's woodlands are truly protected, well below the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework 30% by 2030 target.

Rainforest Concern’s reserves are protected areas. We always maximise protection efficacy through legal action and grassroots initiatives. Using our Neblina Reserve as an example:

• Several areas of the Neblina Reserve are recognised with Sistema Nacional de Áreas Protegidas (SNAP) status by the Ecuadorian Government, a legal protection only shared by a handful of private reserves in Ecuador.

• We monitor Neblina Reserve with camera traps. Although primarily for monitoring biodiversity, they would capture evidence of any human activity.

• Rainforest Concern has built and employs a team of 40 loyal ‘Forest Guards’ for Neblina, our rangers, entirely from local community members. They not only protect the reserve, but their enthusiastic involvement has helped Rainforest Concern grow meaningful collaborative relationships with the local communities, helping to secure long-term sustainability and meaningful conservation outcome.

The evidence is clear that to be effective rainforest protection must be active, not just nominal. Where possible, legally and physically protecting forested land is the most secure long-term means by which to protect rainforest. This is clearly evidenced. Protected areas and indigenous territories together cover just half (49.5%) of the Amazon biome (IUCN). However, between 1985 and 2023, indigenous territories and formally protected areas together accounted for just 6.5% of all vegetation loss across the Amazon; 93.5% of deforestation occurred outside these protected areas (MapBiomas Amazonia, 2024).

A frequent question we get is “Is carbon offsetting a good way to protect rainforests?”

Rainforests are one of our foremost means by which to address both the climate and biodiversity crises, at the same time. However, a growing concern for conservationists is that corporate sponsorship for environmental projects has narrowed dramatically toward carbon, driven by net-zero legislation, voluntary carbon markets (VCMs), and regulatory pressure. While carbon and biodiversity goals often overlap, they are not equivalent, meaning that funders for conservation/environmental projects often favour carbon projects over biodiversity projects. Almost no carbon projects currently deliver carbon credits with quantified biodiversity impacts reported. Maximising carbon while ignoring biodiversity can produce seriously negative outcomes, such as (in the worst cases) planting non-native monocultures that degrade existing ecosystems. Ecosystem resilience depends on biodiversity, not just carbon stocks: a forest that sequesters carbon but has lost its pollinators, seed dispersers, and apex predators is a diminished and fragile system. The carbon and biodiversity crises must be addressed in parallel.

Rainforest Concern works to make our conservation as effective as possible, addressing habitat, biodiversity, rare species and carbon. Rainforest Concern conserves threatened natural habitats, thus protecting the biodiversity and endangered species that they contain and the interests of the indigenous people who depend on them. Rainforest Concern maximises conservation impact through strategically selecting sites for protected areas; we select sites that are extremely biodiverse and house rare species, and critically that also connect larger existing protected areas, protecting migration patterns and the movement and recolonisation of rare species. Rainforest Concern’s work also addresses the carbon crisis - vast quantities of carbon are sequestered and stored in the forests of the Rainforest Concern reserves, both in standing and soil carbon. Email us at [email protected] for more details.