Effectiveness of parks in protecting tropical biodiversity

We assessed the impacts of anthropogenic threats on 93 protected areas in 2 2 tropical countries to test the hypothesis that parks are an effective mea ns to protect tropical biodiversity. We found that the majority of parks ar e successful at stopping land clearing, and to a Lesser degree effective at mitigating logging, hunting, fire, and grazing. Park effectiveness correla tes with basic management activities such as enforcement, boundary demarcat ion, and direct compensation to Local communities, suggesting that even mod est increases in funding would directly increase the ability of parks to pr otect tropical biodiversity.