Conservation research capacity 931


many countries do not yet have the expertise to publish in the international, peer-reviewed literature. Because signifi- cant development in the number of papers produced each year has only occurred in a few countries, and not at all in many countries, we suggest that this may indicate a self- perpetuating cycle in conservation research: conservation researchers working in countries that lack well developed educational institutions and a scientific tradition are at a dis- advantage in securing funding to initiate projects because of the significance attached to publication for career develop- ment (Meijaard et al., 2015; Mammides et al., 2016).


Factors predicting national conservation research output


Population size and literacy rate were good predictors of national conservation research output across sub-Saharan African countries: countries with larger, more literate, pop- ulations tend to have more research institutions, more people who study science (Meijaard et al., 2015), and a great- er capacity to employ students once they are trained (Stocks et al., 2008). Both GDP and international tourism receipts were positive predictors of national conservation research output, probably reflecting economic development and wealth (Amano & Sutherland, 2013). It is generally assumed that greater economic growth is tied to greater spending on scientific infrastructure, new research institutions, and research projects (Kabuye, 2001; Meijaard et al., 2015). In- ternational tourism is a more specialized economic indi- cator than GDP and in countries such as South Africa and Tanzania, both with high conservation research output, tourism and conservation are closely linked. For example, .90% of Tanzania’s tourism sector is wildlife dependent (Caro & Davenport, 2016). In this context, conservation re- search may be driven by the economy: without evidence- based conservation management this USD 2 billion per year industry will not be sustainable (Caro & Davenport, 2016). We suggest that tourism emerged in our analysis as a significant predictor for research output because of this close link between conservation and ecotourism in sub- Saharan Africa, rather than the impact of tourism in gen- eral. Of the variables that were not significant predictors of conservation research output, English was however a sig- nificant factor in several other studies (e.g. Dudgeon, 2003; Fazey et al., 2005; Meijaard & Sheil, 2007; Amano et al., 2016). Language may pose a significant barrier to the acces- sibility of scientific literature to conservation practitioners, but because Web of Science only includes English language journals and all sub-Saharan biological science journals publish in English, with one in both English and French, this study is unable to determine whether publishing lan- guage or economic factors are more important. A higher population growth rate, urban population and agricultural land cover were significant negative predictors


of conservation research output: this profile of a country ex- pected to have low conservation research capacity is there- fore one that needs it the most. By 2030, sub-Saharan Africa is expected to experience the highest population growth rate of any region in the world, with most of the growth occurring in urban megacities (Nagendra et al., 2018). The significant relationship with agricultural land cover is also important to consider, because livelihoods in most sub- Saharan African countries are directly linked to the sus- tainable management of the environment (O’Connell et al., 2019). One strategy for building conservation research cap- acity could be to focus on agricultural teaching institutions in countries with high agricultural land cover and currently low research capacity. The consequences of environmental degradation or environmental conservation are experienced locally, generating a strong motivation for conservation to be based on local knowledge (O’Connell et al., 2019). Our analysis suggests, however, that countries with large urban populations, high population growth rates, and the need to prioritize agricultural production may be limited in their ability to develop scientific infrastructure. Conservation, including research, policy and practice, is


a complex and inherently social process, and thus it is un- surprising that a number of national social, economic and demographic factors contributing to varying levels of con- servation research capacity across countries were identi- fiable in this study (Mascia et al., 2003). Identifying these factors across countries is important because most conser- vation decisions are made at the scale of the national gov- ernment and understanding patterns in research capaci- ty at the national scale allows policymakers to formulate socially equitable, strategic, and effective approaches for research capacity building (Meijaard et al., 2015;O’Connell et al., 2019). We can identify a general profile of an African country with high degree of national conservation research capacity: a large, wealthy country with a low population growth rate, high literacy rate, a relatively less urbanized population, and an economy shifting from agri- culture to other industries such as ecotourism.


Distribution of research across institutions


South Africa dominates the publishing landscape in sub- Saharan Africa: 11 of the top 15 most productive sub- Saharan African institutions are South African, and the remaining institutions produced ,1% of papers with na- tional primary authors. Overall there is clearly a need for more and better postgraduate training institutions dedi- cated to biological conservation for all Africans: in our sam- ple, many institutions in sub-Saharan Africa produced only a single paper with a national primary author. Intellectual export may have resulted in the attribution of some research carried out by African scientists as non-African. Although


Oryx, 2021, 55(6), 924–933 © The Author(s), 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Fauna & Flora International doi:10.1017/S0030605320000046


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