Prioritizing research gaps for national conservation management and policy: the managers’ perspective in Estonia

Abstract

Conservation scientists often lack explicit understanding of the knowledge problems faced in practical conservation, which can be resolved through communication between the scientists and the managers. Focusing on cost-effectiveness of such communication, we planned and implemented a rapid research gap prioritization procedure for the main stakeholder groups in conservation management and policy (‘managers’) in Estonia. The procedure required each research gap to be explicitly linked with its expected application and comprised three steps: (i) preparatory work of the managers to list their main knowledge gaps; (ii) a seminar for representatives of all the main manager groups to sort out the potentially most influential research topics at the national scale; (iii) analysis and synopsis writing of the top-voted topics. Researchers provided the methodology, facilitated the procedure, helped to translate practical problems into research topics and checked the topics for existing research. The paper describes the 13 high-priority research topics, which were distinguished among more than 60 topics listed. Land-use planning decisions (notably in forests) were most frequently perceived to lack critical knowledge, while only two priority topics were listed for political decision-making (both in agricultural policy). The priority topics proposed for wetland conservation focused on management techniques to mitigate artificial drainage. Our experience was that, through direct two-way communication between managers and researchers, the perceived knowledge gaps in conservation can be rapidly and transparently formulated as research topics. However, the managers’ views tend to focus on short-term effects of conservation, and a different procedure may be needed for researchers who might vision for longer and less predictable future.