An Overview Of Our Solution
This program will improve communication and cooperation in-country and throughout Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) by promoting mechanisms for effective information sharing and coordination behaviors through the development of a shared wildlife trade database (A.L.E.R.I.S.) to more effectively address wildlife trafficking challenges. This project seeks to provide technical assistance to: 1) assess the current state of wildlife trafficking; 2) facilitate information sharing through the development of best practices and guidelines, deployment of the A.L.E.R.I.S. database, and relationship building among communities, organizations and governments; and 3) inform policy reform while providing materials to aid technical capacity development to address wildlife trafficking and resulting biodiversity loss.
- Population Impacted: 30,000,000
- Continent: South America
姓
名
机构类型
电子邮件
背景分析
The role of Latin America with respect to illegal wildlife trafficking (IWT) has been increasingly prominent in recent years. The Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) region holds over 40% of the world’s biodiversity (Connelly & Peyronnin, 2021). High levels of biodiversity lend themselves to diverse illegal wildlife trade across a range of ecological zones.
Political and socioeconomic instabilities in the region (such as the crisis in Venezuela), have been identified as significant potential catalysts for IWT activities, facilitating both extraction and transit (Esmail et al., 2020). Traffickers also continue to exploit the connectivity of the continent to move wildlife to consumers both within and outside the region. Between 2004 and 2013, there were over 4,000 individual shipments seized at United States ports of entry with Latin American origins. In total, 47,914 illegal wildlife products and 7,111 illegal animals were seized from 2004 to 2013 (Goyenechea, Alejandra & Indenbaum, 2015).
This form of transnational crime generates tens of billions of dollars for transnational criminal organizations annually, robbing governments and local communities of their resource base and undercutting potential benefit to international wildlife-related tourism. It is estimated that the global value of the illegal wildlife trade is 7-23 USD billion per annum, with 15% of recorded global wildlife seizures originating from Latin America (Nellemann et al., 2016; UNODC, 2016). This threatens the security, economic prosperity, rule of law, conservation efforts, the environment, and human health of affected countries.
描述您希望目标受众采用的技术解决方案。
We want organizational commitments to contribute to and utilize the ALERIS database to increase knowledge, cooperation, and communication, inform policy reform, incorporate community buy-in, educate the public on the current state of wildlife trade and what steps need to be taken to decrease negative impacts. Recognizing barriers to previous information-sharing initiatives, ALERIS will alleviate the required technological capacity for law enforcement and conservation agencies to engage in the continuous capture and sharing of information. To accomplish this, ALERIS will be built into the business by being free of charge, simple to use, and highly secure, by way of the widely available Microsoft technology. The database is also inherently forward-looking in that it will be fully compatible with existing databases and will continue to influence policy and technical outcomes into the future. This includes engaging organization(s) that maintain comparable databases elsewhere in the world.
描述你的行为干预。
SI: Interviews with local communities, indigenous groups and soliciting input from organizations at all stages of project/database development creates conversation around shared beliefs and expectations and increases buy-in and participation increases chances of sustainability. -Scheduled conferences and training will facilitate peer or community exchanges where others can observe and gain support for the project. -Letters of commitment encourage commitments or pledges to drive the target behavior. -By providing training and eliminating the cost for users we eliminate excuses for not engaging with our database. -A.L.E.R.I.S.’s accompanying website will list participants when it is positively reinforcing to highlight those that are taking part in the target behavior of contributing or utilizing the database leading to positive outcomes. The website also increases exposure and conversation on the topic and solution. The website also provides a platform to promote successes with targeted behaviors. Perhaps most important is that the ALERIS framework is also flexible enough to be revised and co-produced with those agencies charged with combatting IWT to maximize benefit, participation, and ownership in the system. We believe this is particularly important to the early onboarding and adoption of the system, which in turn will encourage even more partnerships across the LAC region moving forward.
使用的行为杠杆
如需要，请更详细地解释你是如何使用杠杆的。
CA: -The database scalability, transferability, security and continued networking will make the target behavior the default option. -The ALERIS database streamlines complex decisions to focus on key info and actions by providing user friendly interfaces and easy access to relevant information. I: -We offer training and provide forums and materials (currently in 3 languages) that describe the target behavior and its importance.-Materials provided give instructions through tutorials and accompanying website. -The interface builds awareness and understanding with clear and easily digestible info.-We provide feedback by assisting with data analysis. MI: -The target behavior is more convenient and accessible with free access for users to decrease costs, provided training and tutorials decreasing learning and implementation time, and data analysis support to decrease effort for users and creates a user friendly and efficient experience in languages to increase convenience and accessibility.
描述项目的实施。
ALERIS is the most efficient, secure, and user-friendly database available to track wildlife trade and presents information in a tailored and scalable interface that encourages interaction and increases chances of successful outcomes when dealing with wildlife trade issues such as policy reform and community education. Providing training and familiarization tools increases the likelihood of successful implementation and sustainable usage practices. Through letters of commitment, we can measure participation to ensure successful utilization of the database. Maintaining communication and soliciting feedback also helped ensure organizations could and were implementing usage of the database to track wildlife trade and inform policy reform and other interventions. Enabling conditions:-ALERIS is simple to learn, easy to use, extremely practical, highly secure, and requires minimal monetary and human capital. -Targeted and directed outreach. -Multiple languages. -Framework is flexible enough to be revised and co-produced with other agencies.Key successes: -A functional, efficient, and user-friendly database that meets the need to track wildlife trade in LAC and inform policy reform and future solutions to the ongoing crisis. -Bringing on multiple organizations in multiple countries committed to contributing to the database and using it to inform their wildlife trade solutions. -Materials and training tools developed in three languages (English, Portuguese, and Spanish) so far.Major obstacles: -Coordinating in multiple languages was overcome with a diverse team with language fluency. -Understanding organizational needs to obtain buy-in and commitment was navigated through relationship building meetings and including organization/community feedback into all steps of the database development process. -Funding is an ongoing challenge to maintain a cost free solution to end users, and we continue to seek out and apply for necessary funds.
描述项目的主导者。谁在主导项目实施?
Our team currently comprises 8 core members from the United States and two LAC countries. We are working with organizations, governments and communities to implement this solution and share it with their peers and neighbors. Implementation can be managed within each organization and we are able provide training to aid in the implementation.
分享参与解决方案开发和实施的关键合作伙伴。
SPECIES has been canvassing the broad community of IWT practitioners and actors across Latin America to identify prospective end users of the ALERIS system. Currently, SPECIES is engaged in deliberations with multiple government agencies or government-adjacent organizations across Latin America, including law enforcement, and adjacent conservation NGO’s charged with informing and/or sharing IWT data with governments. Using our direct and second-order contacts, we have been able to initiate contact and correspond with the following actors in the implementation of ALERIS:
- U.S. Department of State Bureau of Oceans and International Environmental and Scientific Affairs (OES)
- John Jay College (Officer for International Research Partnerships)
- SPDA
- Serfor
- Organismo de Evaluación y Fiscalización Ambiental (OEFA)
- FEMA
- Misión Verde
- Brazil Federal Police
- IBAMA
- ProCosta
- General Directorate for the Protection and Conservation of Biodiversity Ministry of the Environment and Sustainable Development, MADES, Paraguay
- Central American University
- El Salvador National Police (Environmental Division)
谁采用了期望的行为，采取的程度如何? 解释一下你如何测量行为变化的。
Commitment to contributing to or utilizing the database when making policy or community campaign decisions. Letters of commitment from organizations (see list above for organizations) help to measure participation now and in the future. Increases in reporting through the database also provide a metric of success.
项目是如何影响水污染的?请详细说明并包括相关的测量方法。
This has not been measured at this time due to the current stage of the project. We expect measurable impacts in protecting flora and fauna species, strengthening ecosystem resiliency and the communities that they support through policy reform and improved proactive solutions instead of limited reactive punitive actions.
您的解决方案如何促进平等(包括种族、性别、民族、社会阶层/收入，或其他)?
By funding the cost of the database access remains free to uses keeping it from being cost prohibitive. Community interviews including indigenous groups helps ensure all communities can be represented.
可持续发展如何得到促进?
Cutting down on crime, protecting species/wild spaces, and informing improved policy reform will open up and focus resources on preserving natural resources, protecting local community rights and improving access to resources when developing.
可持续性:描述你的解决方案的经济可持续性。
This solution will require an annual fee to maintain free access to all members.
投入产出:实施这些活动的成本是多少?与你上面的结果相比，你的结果如何 这投资吗?
We began with a $300K grant, and the database has an annual fee as listed above. Considering that wildlife trade is a multi-billion dollar enterprise, our investment return is absolutely worthwhile.
如何能将这个解决方案成功推广在其他地方?
This is already being shared and replicated throughout LAC. With the use of specific permissions and privacy settings his database solution can be used as broadly or narrowly as required to increase participation and confidence in the project.
秘鲁地区适用
描述该技术解决方案如何解决秘鲁亚马逊地区的野生动物贩运问题。
Our database brings together groups from the government, educational system, nonprofit arena and the community to work together in solving this crisis. We are currently building working relationships with 4 organizations in Peru and hope to continue to increase this number while also increasing communication and cooperation among governments, organizations and communities within Peru as well as the surrounding region.
描述您的技术解决方案的可持续性和可扩展性
This database can be scaled down to individual communities or species or up to include multiple countries within the region. Scalability is very flexible through the features of the database. Sustainability would only be limited by participation, which would be maximized by keeping the database free to users, and by cost of the database, which would need to be funded each year.
如果适用，请解释解决方案的进度级别
Organizational and community relationships are being developed between 9 countries so far. The beta version of the database has been developed and is currently waiting on funding for full deployment.
该解决方案的额外资金来源是什么？
We have received an initial grant from the U.S. Dept of State to initiate the project and begin building and testing the database and will run through September 2023.
创新解决方案的成本
Holding an active Microsoft Power BI license will be critical to having an adequate capacity to integrate, display, demonstrate, and analyze the data of real end users, and thus critical to our overall success of ALERIS. The software itself costs $59,940 US dollars per year to run and keep the service free for all users, so that access is not cost prohibitive.