Success from the Ground Up?
Participatory Monitoring in Forest
Restoration
Manuel R. Guariguata and Kristen Evans

Forest and Landscape Restoration
“Principle 8”
Participatory monitoring… should be designed to generate the
information necessary for stakeholders to collaboratively assess
and adapt their planned interventions to evolving needs,
objectives, opinions and circumstances.

“Restoration becomes a
linking pin between
global interests and
local needs; between
production and
conservation goals”
“Monitoring is often the
last thing planned and
the first thing cut”

The challenge
Connect global monitoring needs and
capacities with local ones
Meet global targets
Compare/share progress across regions/projects
Provide accountability to funders
Remote sensing
Track progress to local restoration goals
Ensure benefits and incentives for locals
Catalyze learning and adaptation
Use locally appropriate technologies
LOCAL
GLOBAL
Participatory
monitoring

Local people monitor what remote
sensing cannot…
With appropriate training and crosschecking — they can reliably
 Collect data on forest change, drivers and threats
 Generate evidence to gauge biophysical and socioeconomic
impacts

“Disaggregating” monitoring
•
Category
Primary data
gatherers
Primary users of
data
Externally driven,
professionally executed
professional researchers professional researchers
Externally driven with local
data collectors
professional researchers,
local people
professional researchers
Collaborative monitoring
with external data
interpretation
local people with
professional researcher
advice
local people and
professional researchers
Collaborative monitoring
with local data
interpretation
local people with
professional researcher
advice
local people
Autonomous local
monitoring
local people local people

 Local involvement is necessary to build the foundation for long-
term restoration success
• Creates sense of ownership, buy-in and trust
• Increases speed and effectiveness of local decision-making
• Catalyzes social learning and adaptive management
Lessons learned from our review

Lessons learned
 Local monitors can provide reliable, accurate
monitoring data with appropriate training,
motivation and cross-checking
 Local monitoring can be cost effective but
requires investment at the outset
 Planning and implementing a local monitoring
system is a slow process
 Generating and maintaining local participation
can be challenging

Proposed guidance for
setting up a scalable,
multi-site participatory
monitoring system
1. Set up a monitoring system and a
mechanism to oversee it
2. Dedicate funds for participatory
monitoring
3. Make the monitoring plans at the
beginning
4. Set clear goals, objectives and
targets collaboratively

5. Identify a small number of shared
indicators with options for additional
indicators
6. Pick locally appropriate technologies
that collect data adequate for
decision-making
7. Communicate monitoring results in a
meaningful way
8. Involve women and marginalized
groups
9. Encourage social learning

A multi-level, multi-site,
participatory monitoring system?
Share, analyze, learn,
adapt and improve
with multiple
iterations
Local Pilot Sites
Identify local questions/indicators
Develop/test methods
Define appropriate incentives
Determine costs
Share lessons-learned
National Support
Develop communications plan
Identify monitoring capacity
Develop training capacity
Build national network
Institutionalize
Global Network
Identify global questions/indicators
Dedicate monitoring budget
Plan data sharing infrastructure
Identify remote sensing approach
Build partner networks
Implementation

Monitoring many dimensions
What does success “look” like?
At the landscape….
On paper…
To local people?