The National Workshop on Large Landscape Conservation

October 22 - 24, 2014

Today’s global conservation community is facing what some might call an implementation bottleneck. Despite the development of vast amounts of new climate models and vulnerability assessments, biodiversity and species population information, spatial analyses, and economic valuation studies, the successful delivery and implementation of these resources remain elusive. George Bernard Shaw once said “The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.” Science users report, they do not have access to much of the information needed to inform decisions. Meanwhile science providers report that the information was delivered. Somewhere, there is a breakdown in communications.

In order for the conservation community to overcome this implementation bottleneck, our presentation will: (1) review the role of science delivery in informing decisions, (2) present results from recent meetings and studies that make the claim an illusion too often exists that science delivery has occurred, and (3) provide examples of best practices using new media to make scientific information accessible and engaging. The information presented will be part of a wider collaboration of communications professionals in the national Landscape Conservation Cooperative (LCC) Network.

The panel will provide perspectives from three different LCCs in the LCC Network with case examples. This information will give context to a group discussion around strategies for using new media to address communications breakdowns in the conservation community. The results of this session will feed into a strategic communications planning process for the LCC Network as a whole.