People, parks, forests or fields : A realistic view of tropical forest conservation

This article is a rejoinder to the preceding article, ‘Conserved to death: are tropical forests being over-protected from people?’, by David Wood. It has three aims: to comment on Woodʹs paper, to look at current approaches to park and forest protection, and to review the opportunities for and constraints upon resource management by rural communities. The author concludes that, until it is clear what makes people manage resources effectively over the long term, we cannot abandon park protection as a method of conserving biodiversity.