Monitoring natural resources for policy interventions:: a conceptual framework, issues, and challenges

Periodic monitoring of the status of natural resources is fundamental to generating adequate information for planning and policy-making for their sustainable management. This paper provides an overview of the concepts, issues and challenges that planners and policy makers face in designing natural resource monitoring systems and using their outcomes in the formulation of policies and intervention programs. It begins with a discussion of a new conceptual framework for monitoring based on resource management domains (RMDs), which defines monitoring units based on resource problems and potential policy interventions. This is followed by a description of steps necessary for effectively implementing a monitoring system and possible flows and use of information in decision-making. Finally, the paper identifies issues relevant to the design of natural resource monitoring systems, and future challenges facing governments, academic institutions, and donor agencies. The paper concludes that a monitoring system which is simple, user-driven, based on existing institutional structures, and has the commitment of decision makers for using the information in policy design and program development is more likely to be successful.