The canny contributor – or why real conservationists do real conservation work.

How many degrees of separation exist between your contributions to conservation and real work being done to repair our battered environment?

The search for practical conservation and environmental repair starts out with the well known and highly publicised names in the conservation world. It rapidly becomes more of an archaeological dig than a celebration of the achievements of conservationists.

A Google search of conservation groups will lead you firstly to a string of multi-million dollar activist groups and peak bodies. All are touting for your donation or your membership and list an impressive sounding list of current campaigns. Current campaigns can also be called “our projects” or “get involved”.

We all recognise the benefits of desk driven activities. But how many desks does our environment need?

Tagging the desks is not hard. There is the campaigning desk, the advice desk, the education desk, the communications desk, the advocacy desk, the policy development desk, the public awareness desk, the publications desk and the research desk, just to name a few.

No-one can doubt the benefit of having all these desks. The peak body model whereby a range of smaller or more service focused organisations form themselves into one association that can address the big picture questions on their behalf is well established.

The question remains however, where are we investing our contributions and how much of that money is really being used for conservation?

Lobbying and education are both noble undertakings and if I am being asked to contribute to a lobby group or education foundation they are causes worthy of favourable consideration.

Public Awareness used to be called Public Relations and has always been an expensive addition to the marketing and advertising budget in any industry. And to take this interpretation to absurd levels, advocacy used to be the task of our elected representatives.

So if we believe “real environmentalists do real environmental work” investing in Australia’s natural future needs to be a carefully thought through exercise.

If you believe your dollar should be invested addressing political issues then it pays to look carefully for conservation organisations that are respected within the halls of power. They will be the organisations who criticize government in a rational and constructive manner and are occasionally found to be partnering with government on particular environmental projects.

Let’s be clear though. Donations to a body that lobby’s government or educates the public achieve very little in practical environmental works.

If you would rather your dollar was spent in a more practical fashion there are two major signposts to satisfaction. 

The first is the existence of a membership or volunteer base where real folk like to get their hands dirty delivering on their promises.

The second involves partnerships that involve two or more groups working on the same practical project – not partnerships that exist simply to drive a range of desks.

And now some examples of best practice. If you are looking for great partnerships it’s hard to go past Landcare. Landcare brings together people from all sectors of our community and they love to get their hands dirty.

Looking to a more focused group, Field and Game Australia Inc has thousands of members who get more than a little excited about revegetation and water management works in Australia’s vulnerable wetland environments.  Through their WET Public Fund the Field and Game members have purchased more than 2000 ha of degraded wetlands and are now in the process of bringing them back to pristine shape.

And the final source of satisfaction involves a piece of advice your grandmother might have given you. Look in your own back yard if you don’t have a specific environmental passion but would like to contribute.  Local and regional conservation groups will proudly show the work they have undertaken. If you think their efforts are worthwhile, invest your dollars there before setting out to save the planet at $30 a month.

Peter Rice