Are protected areas good for the human species? Effects of protected areas on rural depopulation in Spain

Highlights

• Effects of protected areas (PAs) on rural depopulation in Spain were assessed.

• A MPBACI design with covariate control was applied in a census of municipalities.

• With some exceptions, rural municipalities in PAs had worse depopulation figures.

• SCI was the best-performing multiple-use PA category against rural depopulation.

• State intervention is suggested to offset negative impacts of PA regulations.

Abstract

Protected areas (PAs) seek to conserve valuable genes, species and ecosystems by applying a legal regime that restricts some socioeconomic activities and also offers opportunities for new ones. As a result, PAs have been claimed by some authors to boost socioeconomic conditions in rural areas mainly through tourism activities. However, others have claimed that PAs contribute to rural depopulation through the worsening of living conditions of local residents because of restrictions resulting from protection regulations. Here, we applied a multiple-paired Before-After-Control-Impact (BACI) research design on a census on protected rural municipalities (cases; N = 52) versus unprotected rural municipalities (controls; N = 55) in Spain to ascertain whether PAs had positive or negative effects on rural populations using three indicators on depopulation with official municipal data from 1996 until 2019: Compound annual growth rate (CAGR); Proportion of reproductive individuals (REP); and Proportion of reproductive females (WREP). We controlled for some confounders such as biophysical characteristics and regional regulations by carefully selecting our sample of municipalities spatially. Our results show that depopulation figures were worse in cases than in controls, with some exceptions whose characteristics should be further explored. Municipalities in Sites of Community Importance (SCIs) performed best against rural depopulation and generally better than their controls, whereas municipalities in Biosphere Reserves and Special Protection Areas (SPAs) showed mostly worse figures. Our findings suggest that, while necessary and important for biodiversity, multiple-use PAs generally entailed negative consequences for Spanish rural populations that need to be offset by State's intervention.

Introduction

Protected areas (PAs) are legally recognised and geographically defined spaces aimed at the long-term conservation of biodiversity, ecosystem services and associated cultural values (Dudley, 2008). Currently, PAs cover more than 20 million km², or 15% of the terrestrial and freshwater ecosystems globally (Protected Planet, 2020). Actually, biodiversity conservation is the second largest land use globally after agriculture which covers around 30% of the World's terrestrial area (UNEP, 2014). Current international biodiversity targets for 2020 (CBD, 2010) are political in nature and far lower than what scientific studies recommend in light of disappointing conservation outcomes (Butchart et al., 2010; Noss et al., 2012; IPBES; 2019), especially for the most important areas for biodiversity (Butchart et al., 2015; Cunningham and Beazley, 2018; UNEP-WCMC et al., 2018). Therefore, countries and international conservation organisations are having active discussions to set up more ambitious and scientifically-driven post-2020 biodiversity targets (CBD, 2020), which will most likely entail a substantial increase both in PA coverage and greater legal and managerial stringency in order to curve down biodiversity loss (IUCN, 2020).

PAs include the remaining populations of many endangered species, as well as other species of conservation interest (Deguise and Kerr, 2006; Barnes et al., 2016). Nevertheless, PAs do not only harbour important biodiversity. Some PAs, especially in highly humanised contexts like Europe, also include human populations within their boundaries. A broad distinction of PAs according to their legal stringency can be made between: ‘reserves’ (i.e. legally stringent PAs that restrict or forbid most human activities within their boundaries) and ‘multiple-use PAs’ (i.e. legally lenient PAs that allow a diversity of human uses that are compatible with the conservation of biodiversity; Nelson and Chomitz, 2011). Reserves generally align with IUCN management categories I, II and III, whereas multiple-use PAs usually encompass categories IV to VI (Nagendra, 2008). Human populations are not usually allowed to live inside ‘reserves’ whereas in some areas like South America, India, Central Africa, Mongolia or the European Union, large PAs such as nature parks, Biosphere Reserves, Natura 2000 sites or even national parks may include human dwellings and a range of socioeconomic activities (Coad et al., 2008; Rodríguez-Rodríguez, 2012; Järv et al., 2016; UNESCO, 2019; European Commission, 2020a). Together with expected positive biodiversity outcomes, forecast increases in international biodiversity protection targets will most likely involve greater social and economic impacts on human populations around the World, chiefly for those living in rural areas and in developing nations (Ferraro, 2002; Naughton-Treves et al., 2005; De Santo, 2013).

A diversity of studies have assessed the environmental effects of PAs in different settings (Geldmann et al., 2013; Davis et al., 2014; Edgar et al., 2014; Spracklen et al., 2015; Barnes et al., 2016). However, not so many have yet assessed the social and economic effects of PAs on local communities (Joppa, 2012), especially in Europe (Jones et al., 2020). On the one hand, many PAs are located in remote, socioeconomically depressed areas where conservation regulations do not affect human interests much; On the other, PAs harbour a range of well-conserved natural and cultural heritage that may act as endogenous socioeconomic drivers for rural areas (Chape et al., 2008). Therefore, two main strains of thought interpret PAs' social and economic impacts. The first one considers PAs as socioeconomic drivers that promote sustainable development of rural populations as a result of direct employment in PAs or new business opportunities linked to eco-friendly products and services such as tourism (Kettunen and ten Brink, 2013; Sala et al., 2013; Stolton et al., 2015). The second one deems PAs bureaucratic hindrances to local development that result in the impoverishment, loss of quality of life and marginalisation of affected rural areas (West et al., 2006; De Santo, 2013; Paniagua, 2017). Either way, the regulations in force to conserve biodiversity impose some restrictions to the customary use of natural resources that are likely to affect local residents and businesses positively or negatively on a sectoral, case-by-case basis (Naughton-Treves et al., 2005; Oglethorpe et al., 2007; Coad et al., 2008; Joppa et al., 2009; Joppa, 2012; Jones et al., 2020).

The European Union created the largest multi-nationally coordinated PA network in 1992: The Natura 2000 Network (EEC, 1992). It is made of three multiple-use PA categories aimed at sustainable development: Sites of Community Importance (SCIs); Special Areas of Conservation (SACs); and Special Protection Areas for Birds (SPAs; European Commission, 2020a). Together, they cover 17.9% of the Union's land territory (EEA, 2020a) and the largest part of its countries' designated protected area, mostly in rural areas. However, Natura 2000 planning and management processes have not always had sufficient stakeholder input across the European Union (Ferranti et al., 2014; Blicharska et al., 2016). As a result, designation of PAs has sometimes been contested by local populations on governance and socioeconomic grounds that may influence depopulation of rural areas (Grodzinska-Jurczak and Cent, 2011; Vidal-González and Calero, 2014). In other cases, local populations have actively advocated for the protection of some natural areas (Pérez, 2013).

Depopulation of rural areas in the European Union is a selective process that is chiefly driven by two main factors: 1) Negative birth-death dynamics and; 2) Emigration of young people and middle aged people, especially of trained young women, to middle cities as a result of insufficient job opportunities, transport and communication infrastructures, social care and health facilities, education and banking services, and cultural activities (Perpiña Castillo et al., 2018). Young and middle age classes are however essential to the maintenance of rural populations as they deal with basic socioeconomic activities including productive work, reproduction and care of the elderly (Delgado and Martínez, 2017; CES, 2018).

Spain is a biodiversity-rich, Mediterranean country of the European Union (Araújo et al., 2007; Múgica et al., 2010). Twenty-eight point twelve per cent of its land and freshwater territory has been designated under different, sometimes overlapping, categories of PAs (UNEP-WCMC and IUCN, 2020). This makes the largest absolute PA coverage figures of the European Union and one of the largest World's relative figures (OECD, 2017; EEA, 2020a). Spain also outstands as the second world's tourism destination (UNWTO, 2019). It has a rich natural and cultural heritage (UNESCO, 2017, UNESCO, 2020), a vast territorial capital that may help to revitalise depressed rural areas (Labianca and Navarro, 2019; Molinero and Alario, 2019). At the same time, loss of population in rural areas is a long-lasting phenomenon in Spain and other European areas as a result of poorer living conditions linked to fewer job opportunities and less access to essential services than in urban areas (CES, 2018; Perpiña Castillo et al., 2018; Molinero and Alario, 2019). In particular, scarcity of young women due to scant job opportunities, limited services and greater gender discrimination than in urban areas is one of the major limitations to rural demography in Spain (Bustos, 2005; CES, 2018). Rural depopulation has resulted in environmental and socioeconomic impacts in rural areas, including: agricultural abandonment; natural succession and forest recovery leading to increased fire risk; massive land development around main cities and coastal areas; ageing; predominantly male resident populations; decline of traditional economic activities and cultural practices; and marginalisation of remote rural populations (Saco, 2010; Van der Zanden et al., 2017; CES, 2018; Labianca and Navarro, 2019).

In the European Union, depopulation of rural areas has been addressed through specific policies, such as cohesion policy instruments or the second pillar of the Common Agricultural Policy, devoted to rural development (European Parliament, 2017, European Parliament, 2020). Such policies have been translated to the Spanish rural context through regional development programmes using EAFRD funds, although with marked regional differences in implementation and efficiency across the country's autonomous regions (CES, 2018). Only recently was rural depopulation paid attention to at national scale by the passing of the Law on Sustainable Rural Development (Spanish Government, 2007a) and its implementing Sustainable Rural Development Programme (Spanish Government, 2010). More recently, the Spanish Government has paid more institutional attention to the issue by producing the National Strategy before the Demographic Challenge (Spanish Government, 2019) and creating the Ministry for Ecological Transition and Demographic Challenge (Spanish Government, 2020a). Nevertheless, the implementation of the measures included in such policies is low, slow and very different across measures so far (CES, 2018).

To our knowledge, no study has yet scientifically assessed the effects of PAs on human demography in a country with acute rural depopulation figures and more than one fourth of its territory under biodiversity conservation regulations such as Spain. Are PAs an opportunity for sustainable development in impoverished rural Spain or the final blow for human populations in Spanish rural areas? This is the research question we tried to answer here through a two-tailed hypothesis that was tested: PAs have had an impact on human demography in rural Spain. We assessed the effects of PA designation on human populations in rural Spain with an emphasis in the reproductively-active cohort, and explored possible contextual factors for those effects.