Understanding constraints to adaptation using a community-centred toolkit

Abstract

Worldwide, marginalized and low-income communities will disproportionately suffer climate change impacts while also retaining the least political power to mitigate their consequences. To adapt to environmental shocks, communities must balance intensifying natural resource consumption with the need to ensure the sustainability of ecosystem provisioning services. Thus, scientists have long been providing policy recommendations that seek to balance humanitarian needs with the best outcomes for the conservation of ecosystems and wildlife. However, many conservation and development practitioners from biological backgrounds receive minimal training in either social research methods or participatory project design. Without a clear understanding of the sociocultural factors shaping decision-making, their initiatives may fail to meet their goals, even when communities support proposed initiatives. This paper explores the underlying assumptions of a community's agency, or its ability to develop and enact preferred resilience-enhancing adaptations. We present a context-adaptable toolkit to assess community agency, identify barriers to adaptation, and survey perceptions of behaviour change around natural resource conservation and alternative food acquisition strategies. This tool draws on public health and ecology methods to facilitate conversations between community members, practitioners and scientists. We then provide insights from the toolkit's collaborative development and pilot testing with Vezo fishing communities in southwestern Madagascar.

This article is part of the theme issue ‘Climate change adaptation needs a science of culture’.

Tondro tokana tsy maha foy hao zao

 (One finger cannot pick lice)—Vezo proverb

1. Introduction

Ecosystems globally are increasingly threatened by the compounding effects of the anthropogenic climate crisis. The consequences of this crisis disproportionately impact local, rural Indigenous and descendant (LID) communities [1–5]. Major environmental changes from anthropogenic climate change threaten LID community water supplies, diet, health, sovereignty and sustainability [6–8]. These pressures are especially consequential for people in rural and remote areas who rely on subsistence food systems. These challenges often intersect with the conservation of natural resources and community sovereignty; Indigenous peoples manage or have tenure rights over a quarter of the world's land surface, which converges with 40 per cent of global protected areas [9]. Thus, governmental and non-governmental organizations have focused their efforts on instituting community-based conservation initiatives, especially in the global south [10,11].

(a) . Community-based approaches and participatory methods

Despite intentions to balance community well-being with conservation, community-based approaches to conservation have sometimes infringed upon both people's self-determination and adaptive capacity [12–16]. Since the 1870s, the dominant discourse within international conservation has been ‘fortress conservation’—a top–down form of sustainability policy barring local communities from accessing resources in protected spaces [17–19]. While these efforts are designed to preserve the beauty and ecosystem health of natural spaces, they often uphold colonial power structures that disempower and displace LID peoples, limiting their access to resources and endangering human health [20–24]. In response, initiatives to decolonize conservation call for the co-production of protected area planning and management with LID communities [17,18,25].

Alongside calls for community-centred approaches to conservation, there is a large social science literature on participatory methods to facilitate community-generated ideas for projects that address natural resource management. These community-centred approaches also offer an alternative to top–down interdisciplinary project development that progresses through a so-called loading-dock approach. In top–down projects, each specialist (inclusive of scientists, political action groups and policymakers, but not LID community members) tends to engage fully with their piece of the project and hands their output down to the next specialist [26]. By the time the last specialist delivers the completed package to the practitioner, however, the science used to inform each stage of the project has been reinterpreted and reconstructed so many times that it may no longer be faithfully reflected in the output [27,28]. Co-produced projects, or those designed and implemented by transdisciplinary academics and practitioners working together to define a problem and build solutions [29,30], use demonstrably more science than traditional loading-dock approaches [31,32].

(b) . The shortcomings of existing methods

However, Indigenous scientists have raised concerns that co-production frameworks that prioritize incorporating data from Indigenous knowledge systems into Western science approaches are still reproducing settler-colonial extractive processes [33,34]. Some co-production frameworks treat Indigenous knowledge as ‘data’ and local communities as 'stakeholders', not sovereign owners of their land with embodied knowledge systems inseparable from their place-based, relational and temporal context [35–41]. Non-local scientists motivated to facilitate truly decolonial projects must step aside and empower Indigenous communities to claim their right to self-determination as affirmed by the United Nations [42,43]. The First Nations principles of Ownership, Control, Access and Possession (OCAP) is one practical set of recommendations governing data collection, use and protection. Established by the First Nations Information Governance Centre of Canada in response to exclusion from federal censuses in the 1990s, these statements establish data sovereignty standards for researchers working with First Nations [44]; these principles can be appropriately applied by researchers working with LID communities more broadly. In brief, the principles of OCAP recommend that communities maintain (i) Ownership over their cultural knowledge and data; (ii) Control over all aspects of impactful research and data management that impact them; (iii) continued and unmitigated Access to information and data collected about their community; and (iv) Possession of the physical database where that information is held [44]. By approaching data generation and cultural knowledge in this way, researchers can design methods for project facilitation that honour the communities they work with. LID communities' agency—or their ability to develop and enact preferred resilience-enhancing adaptations—and ecosystem functions must be considered not as separate issues, but as one under the framework of food sovereignty [45–49]. Initiatives led by LID communities ensure that food sovereignty is protected in natural resource conservation policies by respecting ‘…the right of peoples to healthy and culturally appropriate food produced through ecologically sound and sustainable methods, and their right to define their own food and agriculture systems’ [50, p. 1]. Healthy collaborations seek to support the work that communities are already doing to actualize their traditional knowledge, rather than inadvertently appropriating traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) into externally enforced policy.

In Vezo communities in Madagascar, this right to sovereignty over one's food system is particularly meaningful [51]. Ethnographic work over the years and our interviews indicate that Vezo people see continued fishing and engagement with the sea as inextricable from their cultural identity [52]. Through oral history, Vezo communities curate generations of observational data about local environmental conditions [53]. Using this archive, community members assert that marine resources are declining, destructive fishing methods wielded by both locals and non-locals are on the rise, and livelihoods must diversify if the community is to survive. As such, the community has a confident understanding of the complex socio-ecological processes driving resource decline. Any projects that assume ignorance, patronize or seek to re-educate rather than build on existing community knowledge are primed for failure. As such, in this project, we built this toolkit to direct academics and non-local practitioners to step aside and facilitate a workshop through which LID communities may define relevant problems and articulate their own solutions using their own knowledge.

The aforementioned pathways to community-empowered development and conservation projects are not only necessary to support adaptation to climate change, but they are also a pathway to the decolonization of field science and conservation through the prioritization of community-generated concerns and solutions. However, at times there remains a disconnect between the decolonial discourse and applied work. In their meta-analysis of academic literature on enacted adaptations to climate change, Berrang-Ford et al. found that many interventions were local, fragmented and incremental, with limited empirical evidence of transformational adaptation and negligible evidence of risk reduction outcomes [54]. In some situations, researchers with a background in the biological sciences working on biodiversity-related issues desire to better align their work with community interests and input, but may have received little to no training in the social sciences and feel unsure of how to proceed. Moreover, the time and training needed to implement successful participatory methods may deter scientists engaged in basic research from applying their research to generate guidance on conservation approaches. This may create a situation in which scientists put forth well-meaning but potentially misguided suggestions for programmatic interventions that are not informed or supported by the input of community partners. Alternatively, there are situations in which scientists lack the knowledge of local stakeholders' perceptions and thus do not provide any suggestions for broader impacts or actionable outcomes from their work, even in questions of humanitarian concerns or biodiversity declines. As the adoption of One Health frameworks becomes more common, and the necessity of acknowledging the interlinkages between the well-being of community and biodiversity in the face of climate change and natural resource challenges increases, it will become increasingly important that all sciences work towards a middle ground of using existing tools to identify and amplify community priorities in meaningful and ethical ways.

(c) . A toolkit for gauging barriers to adaptation

We propose a rapid assessment toolkit to foster better outcomes in conservation research and practice (specifically but not limited to the fields of conservation biology, ecology, forestry and natural resource management). Considering conservation and climate change adaptation initiatives through a lens of agency (i) facilitates discussions around the feasibility of such recommendations, (ii) identifies if and where there may be opportunities for researchers and funders to support community goals and (iii) clarifies obstacles that may prevent communities (or specific subsets of the community) from taking action. Through a process of collaborative ideation, this toolkit encourages researchers and practitioners to listen to and amplify the voices of community members through their published and practical works. This toolkit's intended audience is not only conservation practitioners and policymakers with funding to allocate. It is also designed for researchers who are increasingly expected to deliver on joint conservation and community well-being outcomes and provide policy recommendations when publishing their research.

The toolkit presented in the article is based upon the idea that one's agency to engage in a community project is defined by one's aspirations to participate measured against the barriers to participation. A community may identify a common need (e.g. infrastructural improvements, alternative sources of income, reliable health care etc.), agree on actionable steps for a project addressing this need, and have stakeholders willing and able to lead those steps. However, they may still face barriers (i.e. difficulty securing funding, sourcing materials) that constrain their ability to realize their goal.

We devised a set of focus groups and surveys that document a community's interest in adaptation as considered against barriers to requisite courses of action. To produce this guide, we drew inspiration from the following approaches: Social Adaptive Capacity and Barriers to Care. In Cinner et al. [55]'s framework, Social Adaptive Capacity—the ability of a community to take advantage of opportunities to change—is defined along five domains: availability of assets, flexibility of strategies, ability to act collectively, integrating new knowledge to inform opportunities for change, socio-cognitive constructs and the ability to freely decide whether to act upon them [55]. This final domain—agency—is considered as one's communal or individual ability to take preferred actions in response to environmental changes based on one's assessment of one's own capability, knowledge, resources, motivation and empowerment. Although Cinner and colleagues consider these concepts as applied to events like coral bleaching in tropical coastal communities, they did not operationalize them into measurable ethnographic lines of inquiry (DCB, KETT, DR, SB, GM, RS, FR, CJBM, JYA, JRFT, RMR, HL, TR, KD 2022, pers. comm.). Barnes and colleagues propose indicators for each concept, specifically defining agency as one's ‘Active[ness] in decision-making: actively involved in decision-making about marine resource management’ and ‘Power/influence: perception of power and influence to change or guide the management of marine resources' [56]. However, these indicators were not applied in the field utilizing a questionnaire or other study tool (Cinner pers. comm., 2022). Combining and building upon both definitions and indicators of agency, we have adapted and operationalized these ideas with permission. This builds upon the authors' emphasis on the necessity of participatory processes, in conjunction with barrier identification and removal, as key components of supporting community adaptive capacity.

We organized these constructs into four domains. ‘Openness’ is defined as one's perception of the project idea as positive and acceptable to the community and that one can be open to an idea without being willing or able to act upon it. ‘Willingness’ is defined as one's determination to take actionable steps toward realizing a goal (granted that one must be open to a goal to be willing to pursue it). ‘Access’ is defined as one's ability to use and make decisions about the spaces, resources and outputs relevant to the project. ‘Empowerment’ is defined as one's perception of one's ability to support decision-making about the project in question and in related spheres. We termed these aggregated constructs as ‘aspiration’, or one's desire to take enact upon a preferred option.

Conservation and natural resource management initiatives often address similar programmatic challenges to those encountered within global health partnerships. Global health programmes often engage with local communities, identifying and addressing concerns, and supporting progress towards a preferred course of action through community engagement [57–60]. The field of public health has widely accepted methods for assessing community participation, engaging stakeholders, evaluating programme effectiveness, assessing barriers to participation and scaling initiatives for cross-sectional application. Often public health practitioners use rapid anthropological assessments to gauge community perceptions, priorities and concerns [57,61,62]. Scientists seeking to understand community utilization of natural resources and alternatives in the face of climate change can learn from these approaches.

Such considerations are relevant beyond assessing stakeholder interest, but in forecasting resources projects might be unsuccessful before proposal and implementation. The Barriers to Care Questionnaire (BCQ) is a validated 39-item questionnaire created to assess the obstacles families face when seeking medical care for children with special needs [63,64]. It was developed using a mixed methods approach of focus groups, literature reviews and key informant interviews, which yielded a typology of barriers along five domains: pragmatics, health knowledge and beliefs, expectations about care, skills and marginalization. We have adapted items in this questionnaire, with permission, to be relevant to conservation projects. We provide ways to locally adapt it further by incorporating barriers identified during focus group conversations. This includes drawing on the participants' previous experiences across domains to identify future obstacles and removing survey items that are not relevant. Our toolkit additionally categorizes and assesses potential barriers into five domains adapted with permission from Seid et al. [63], together referred to as ‘Barriers’; ‘Pragmatics’ refers to logistical and cost issues that might prevent or delay appropriate utilization. ‘Skills’ are a set of acquired or learned strategies to navigate through, manipulate, or function competently. ‘Expectations’ refers to expectations of receiving poor-quality support. ‘Marginalization’ refers to having previous negative experiences within conservation. Lastly, ‘Knowledge and beliefs' include lay or popular ideas about conservation practices and natural resource use, which may differ from those of conservation agencies and scientific communities.

The application of the toolkit is informed by the First Nation Principles of OCAP [44] and the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) [43]. Drawing from the OCAP principles, a prerequisite for this work is the understanding that communities control access to and use of their cultural knowledge, data and information. Likewise, this toolkit should be used in situations where goals (identification of target problem and solution) are aligned between all stakeholders involved. We hope that this toolkit will provide a succinct way to introduce scientists to co-produced solutions and encourage them to incorporate community feedback even when funding and time for such investigations are limited.

2. Pilot test

We worked with community leaders and local researchers in Andavadoaka, Madagascar, to develop the two focus group discussion guides and the survey that form this toolkit. Each is rooted in the central question, What do you wish that conservationists and scientists asked you before suggesting changes for your community as you confront climate change and biodiversity loss? This toolkit is designed to guide interviewers through assessing either (1) a community-produced project idea or (2) an external-generated prospective project idea or ongoing project (to assess if and how community and collaborator goals for this project could align). In our case, community leaders involved with the development of this toolkit used it to solicit problems and solutions from the community and explore a novel, community-selected project idea, rather than to collect feedback on an ongoing intervention. We then piloted the toolkit implementation process and present here the results alongside suggestions for the future use of these materials. The Agency Toolkit module (figure 1) is designed to be self-contained and assist the collaborator through each step of the process within a two-week period. We detail a suggested schedule in electronic supplementary materials, S5.

Figure 1.

Infographic of Agency Toolkit components and their objectives, key opportunities for community engagement, expected research outcomes and potential uses. This toolkit includes both focus group and interview components that should be implemented following careful consideration of the community's relationship to the proposed or ongoing project idea in question. We posit several research outcomes guided by best practices in community engagement. Lastly, we suggest potential applications for these insights. (Online version in colour.)

3. Methods

(a) . Study region

In the Southwest Indian Ocean, Madagascar, has been assigned the highest conservation priority of species biodiversity [65], with the southwest region supporting the highest levels of endemism on the island [66]. Southwest Madagascar also stands out as the region where the first marine protected area (MPA) on the island was formally established in 2006 [67]. The Velondriake MPA was established in 2006 as a protected marine area co-managed by local communities and the British conservation NGO (Non-governmental Organization), Blue Ventures, to implement periodic octopus fishery closures during spawning and ultimately increase catch for local fishers [68,69].

Similarly, we documented oral consent for all participants who agreed to individual interviews. Participants did not receive compensation for participating in individual interviews. To ensure the survey respondents' anonymity, we removed names and identifying information from data made accessible for open-source access. The Columbia University Internal Review Board reviewed and deemed this research exempt from approval (Columbia IRB #AAAU3639; PSU IRB #00021067). We conducted this research with the requisite permits and approval from the Centre de Documentation et de Recherche sur l'Art et les Traditions Orales à Madagascar and l'Université de Toliara.

(b) . Focus groups

Our project design included two focus group sessions, one focusing on aspirations and one on barriers. We ran two sets of focus groups discussing separate topics, broken into 10 groups all discussing the same topic. In the first set (102 individuals (49.02% men; 50.98% women), participants were guided through discussions pertaining to their aspirations. In the second set (the same 102 individuals broken into the same groups), participants were guided through discussions pertaining to barriers to their agency. Each participant attended both discussions; we did not recruit new participants for the second set. Local leaders invited participants across households and clans to ensure representation across subsets of the community. Community leaders and members of the research team presented the toolkit idea to all participants and explained the concept of the case study to test and refine these tools. Participants were then subdivided into 10 groups of 10–13 people according to age and gender. Over 2 days, each group participated in both the Aspirations and Barriers Focus Group Discussions (electronic supplementary materials, S2 and S3). Focus groups were moderated by community leaders fluent in English and Malagasy (Vezo dialect) and recorded. Full-length audio recordings of focus group discussions were transcribed in Malagasy, with information from these transcripts entered into the data entry template in (electronic supplementary materials, S6 and S7). We then translated these documents into English. We then qualitatively coded this information in NVIVO to conduct thematic analysis (using open coding) using themes like problems, the importance of those problems, potential solutions and the steps to actualize those solutions.

(c) . Surveys

As part of the co-production of this tool, all survey questions were workshopped with local community members and subject matter experts. We recommend this workshop and adaptation process be a part of tool implementation to (i) ensure the instrument asks questions of interest to community members in ways that are (ii) relevant to the local culture and topics of concern. The survey serves as a base framework that can be adapted with each use.

In this region, as in many regions where this toolkit may be implemented, an existing sampling frame (such as a census) was not available. We surveyed 149 individuals, 99 women (65.56%) and 50 men (33.11%); approximately 10% of the study population. This provided an 8.8% margin of error within a 95% confidence level. In order to effectively sample enough participants while also accounting for differing experiences across the population, we implemented a multistage stratified sample. We mapped our community by employing survey teams to document and number each household in the target area. Available demographic data from the recent regional census (2014–2015, available at https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/blue.ventures/viz/Velondriake_Census_2015_v2_0/VelondriakeCensus) suggested the total population of Andavadoaka to be 1355, approximately 51.7% female and 48.3% male (age subset information for Andavadoaka was not available). We then used a random number generator to select the house numbers of the households to be sampled. We marked these on each surveyor's map and allotted a total quota of people per interviewer (one person per household). We subdivided this quota as half male and half female and across genders a roughly third of each gender in the following age brackets: 18–24 (young adult), 24–49 (adult) and 50 + (senior). If a household was not available, that interviewer marked the house for one follow-up but otherwise proceeded to the following house. At the individual level, each interviewer cycled through the substrata until each sub-quota was complete. This multistage stratified approach allowed us to cover large areas, while also sampling a diverse subset of the population.

Interviews took place inside or near each individual's home, at the discretion of the participant, to protect the participant's privacy. Researchers fluent in Malagasy obtained consent from participants and administered the survey in Enketo Webforms (KoboToolbox) on iPads. Survey questions are available in electronic supplementary materials S1. Following the BCQ, barriers were measured on a Likert scale from ‘No problem – 1’, ‘Small problem – 2’, ‘Problem – 3’, ‘Big Problem – 4’ and ‘Very Big Problem – 5’.

4. Results

(a) . Focus groups

Results across 10 groups (FGD A) suggested that the depletion of marine resources was the most significant problem for Andavadoaka (other problems that emerged at lower frequencies included lack of employment opportunities, rising incidence of theft and insufficient drinking water among others). Identified factors driving marine resource depletion included decreased precipitation (attributed to climate change), erosion and marine habitat destruction (attributed to increasingly destructive cyclones and destructive fishing methods, respectively) and overuse of fisheries (attributed to illegal fishing methods and overpopulation due particularly to increased immigration, as well as to rising to birth rates). Across focus groups, seven sessions converged on alternative livelihoods as both a necessary adaptive mechanism for and solution to marine resource depletion. Two sessions converged upon a salt mining project, two sessions suggested a tourist-oriented artisan business, and four sessions suggested a duck husbandry project. Eight groups mentioned forming associations or other forms of collective action as a vital component of climate change adaptation.

We selected duck husbandry as the focus of this case study because it was the most mentioned alternative livelihood idea. The combined results of FGD B suggested five steps to actualization: (i) formation of an association and sourcing of ducks, (ii) training and capacity building, (iii) building facilities to house the ducks, (iv) raising the ducks and (v) transport, sale, and reinvestment of profits into the association and related costs. We included each community-identified action item in the surveys for the stepwise assessment of openness, willingness and access. We also used data from this focus group to write survey questions about barriers of interest to the community. These included the start-up costs of ducks, concerns about duck theft and the need for veterinary medicine. Together, focus group participants indicated external involvement would be most desirable and impactful as (i) funding and sourcing of ducks, and (ii) training on duck husbandry to lower skill-related barriers for some participants.

(b) . Survey

Aspiration for the duck husbandry project idea was considered along four domains: empowerment, openness, willingness and access. General empowerment was high, with 82.12% (124) of respondents stating they felt very active in their community's decision-making processes (figure 2). Almost half, 43.05% (65), agreed with the statement that ‘I am a part of a group decision-making process that others respect and act on’ and 24.50% (37) self-identified as leaders (I make decisions for my community that others respect and act on). Regarding this project, 81.46% (123) of respondents felt they would be able to voice concerns to community leaders, but only 44.37% (67) expected community leaders to listen to those opinions. During FDG –B, participants suggested strategies to address this, including having small, regional chapters to the large duck husbandry association, where leaders acted as delegates for consistent opinions. Participants noted it would be important to balance power so that one person's opinions did not dominate decision-making.

Figure 2.

Comparisons of perceived empowerment (as indicated by involvement in decisions related to community projects) across genders and educational status, measured by highest level of education attained (% and N of respondents). Participants gauged their perceived engagement in community decision-making processes as ‘very active’, ‘moderately active’, ‘barely active’ or ‘inactive’. (Online version in colour.)

Overall interest in the community-generated duck husbandry project was high, with 84.77% (128) stating they feel it is an acceptable idea for the community. We also considered openness and willingness regarding each step of the project (figure 3). Three-quarters 77.48% (117) were very open to the idea of a duck husbandry association, 80.79% (122) to training, 68.21% (103) for facilities construction using locally available materials, 75.50% (114) for duck husbandry and 82.78% (125) to sale and reinvestment of profits via the collective. Willingness was also high, with 73.51% (111) willing to assist with forming an association, 73.51% (111) to attend training, 66.23% (100) to construct facilities, 71.52% (108) to engage in duck husbandry and 78.81% (119) to participate in the sale of ducks. Access to resources and spaces was mixed: steps one through four occur in publicly accessible spaces, with little barrier to access. Participants reported that materials to build duck houses are locally available and affordable, and so are highly accessible (‘I can get these resources, no problem’ at 33.77% (51) and ‘I need to ask permission to use these resources and I will likely get access' at 23.84% (36). A baseline of above 50% for access is notable, as this is a control metric for access to resources without any external support or funding, and thus indicates a feasible starting point in the perception of community leadership. Similar responses were recorded for duck feed 38.41% (58) and medicines, 23.84% (36). Participants reported that ducks can be sold for the best profit in Morombe, but participants reported that they could not get transport there. Over a quarter of respondents, 27.8% (42), expressed concern about accessing resources related to transporting ducks (cars, gasoline etc.). 23.18% (35) said they could get to Morombe, but it's challenging. Nearly half, 40.4%, (61) reported they would sell ducks locally, even at a reduced profit, given these limitations. While ducks can be sold within a walkable radius, this identifies another potential area for external support. Similarly, access to resources was split, with foundational investments needed to purchase ducks and provide veterinary medicines, but most ongoing costs like food and housing materials were reported to be minimal.

Figure 3.

Openness and willingness (N of respondents) in regard to each community-identified step of the duck husbandry project. The interview evaluates participants' view of whether an idea is acceptable (openness) and if they are actively interested in participation (willingness). Willingness was self-reported as ‘Very willing’, ‘moderately willing’, slightly willing’, ‘neutral’, slightly unwilling’, ‘moderately unwilling’ and ‘very unwilling’. Openness was defined as ‘very open’, ‘moderately open’, ‘slightly open’, ‘neutral’, ‘slightly opposed’, ‘moderately opposed’ and ‘very opposed’. Likert responses with zero counts are omitted from this figure. (Online version in colour.)

This survey lists 41 potential barriers that constrain individuals' agency and may prevent successful participation in the project. Users may also add additional barriers, unique to a given project or community, that emerge during focus group discussions. On average, participants rated the majority of barriers as ‘small’ or surmountable: pragmatics (1.98 s.d. ± 1.02), skills (2.36 s.d. ± 1.02), expectations (2.61 s.d. ± 1.07), marginalization (2.34 s.d. ± 1.00) and knowledge and beliefs (2.58 s.d. ± 1.13). Top barriers of concern included ‘a lack of communication between project staff members and other groups of people working on the broader topic of alternative livelihoods' (3.01 s.d. ± 1.07), ‘a lack of communication between all parts of my community involved in the broader topic of alternative livelihoods’ (2.96 s.d. ± 1.08), and ‘project staff having different opinions about the broader topic of alternative livelihoods than I do’ (2.96 s.d. ± 1.21) (electronic supplementary material, table S1). Perceptions of barriers were comparable across genders (figure 4); people with no formal education did not appear to rank barriers more highly than those with more education (figure 5a,b). This barriers scale helps illuminate ideological concerns, which complements the logistical concerns that emerged during focus group conversations. Overall, the duck husbandry project would be deemed feasible with community agencies supported by external funding at key junctures (initial duck broods, veterinary supplies, transport to major markets). In the absence of external funding, the community suggested taking an initial collection of start-up funds from prospective members of the association and using this to overcome start-up costs.

Figure 4.

Comparison of the barriers in project participation (aggregated to domain) between genders (% of respondents). Barriers are collapsed to their respective domains of pragmatics, skills, expectations, marginalization and knowledge & beliefs. For each barrier, participants rated it as a ‘very big problem’, ‘big problem’, ‘problem’, ‘small problem’, ‘no problem’ or ‘not applicable’. (Online version in colour.)

Figure 5.

(a) Comparison of the barriers in project participation (aggregated to domain) between educational status, measured by highest level of education attained (% of respondents). For each barrier, participants rated it as a ‘very big problem’, ‘big problem’, ‘problem’, ‘problem’, ‘no problem’ or ‘not applicable’. (b) Comparison of the barriers in project participation (totaled overall across questions) between educational status, measured by highest level of education attained (% of respondents). For each barrier, participants rated it as a ‘very big problem’, ‘big problem’, ‘problem’, ‘problem’, ‘no problem’ or ‘not applicable’. (Online version in colour.)

5. Discussion

Community-led adaptation strategies are vital to LID communities' abilities to mitigate the consequences of climate change [3,70]. The anthropogenic climate crisis has caused marked disruptions in tropical ecosystems, threatening biodiversity and leading to greater food insecurity in tropical subsistence communities worldwide. Such ecosystem impacts, as seen in Madagascar, are widespread and catastrophic (e.g. destabilized precipitation regimes, rising sea levels, rising temperatures and aridification) [71–74]. These impacts are particularly severe on fragile ecosystems like the coral reefs that Andavadoaka relies upon [75–78]. This precarity is especially consequential for both economic and nutritional resilience, given that goods, services and livelihoods derived from global coral reefs are valued at over an estimated USD 30 billion, and fishing and aquaculture support 1.5 million people in Madagascar (over 7% of national GDP and 6.6% annual total exports) [79,80]. Beyond corals, rising temperatures are changing all marine ecosystems. Shifting temperature gradients alter circulations, nutrient flows and species distributions [81–83]. These impacts are severe and occur far outside the rate and scope of normal variability, threatening the human populations who rely upon locally impacted species for income and subsistence [84].

Biodiversity is vital for food security for many Indigenous populations [85], and Andavadoaka is no different. Participants highlighted fishery productivity as a consistent concern, with many focus groups ascribing it directly to climate change, or indirectly to higher demand on marine resources due to immigration from regions with drought and crop failures. This is consistent with the existing literature on climate change in Madagascar, which is linked to increased internal migration, disrupted agricultural practices and increased reliance on natural resources [86]. As conditions deteriorate, small-scale farmers will be particularly vulnerable [87]. Focus groups suggested several solutions to the economic hardships due to decreased fisheries yields, including fostering alternative livelihoods (i.e. duck husbandry, salt mining or tourist-oriented artisan business) and managing population growth through women's health initiatives. Strategies produced by the community were in line with ‘official’ recommendations of depleted fisheries [88] and other findings in similar situations in Ghana [89] and Sri Lanka [90].

During the pilot, participants generated several alternative livelihood project ideas, converging on a duck husbandry project. The study community displayed a high degree of aspiration (openness, willingness, empowerment, and access to resources and spaces), but expressed logistical challenges related to transportation and cost. This complements findings from communities surrounding the Dja Faunal Reserve in Cameroon [91]. These authors similarly found that participants predicted that community-level projects would be stalled by interpersonal conflicts and that transportation would be difficult and costly, especially in the rainy season (May–November). However, in Andavadoaka, respondents expressed less mistrust of the intentions of NGOs than in the Dja Faunal Reserve villages and more trust in fellow community members through the formation of an association to manage profits from the project. These parallel studies highlight the importance of understanding both a community's unique historical experiences with external collaborators and their potential concerns, which likely differ not only across but within communities. Similar interventions may be received very differently and realized to different degrees with differing levels of success, all based on these unique community-level factors.

(a) . What is community?

As noted in the Positionality Statement (see electronic supplementary material), we chose to work within local power structures as we recognize our approach does not transcend local power dynamics. Common concerns raised by development practitioners are what defines a community and how to develop interventions that reach equally across as much of the community as possible [92]. As Follett succinctly defines, ‘community is a process' [93]. All communities possess several of the following variables: dense and involved social bonds, attachments to interactions with institutions, rituals, small group size, a sense of commonality around a defining characteristic and a common purpose or belief [94,95]. Examples of defining characteristics might be residence in the same neighbourhood, following the teachings of the same philosopher, or identification with a similar heritage. However, ‘community belonging’ does not automatically mean exclusionary factors like racism, sexism, homophobia, ableism or classism are not in effect [96–100], and development practitioners must be aware of how power dynamics may affect participation. Moreover, membership in communities of place does not necessarily mean an individual will spend more time with other members than those outside the community [101,102].

In Andavadoaka, involvement in the community is complex; Vezo people move seasonally to follow fish stocks and part-time residents are an integral part of everyday community activities, but only those ancestrally tied to the land may access certain communal resources (i.e. salt fields and graveyards). However, at least part-time residence in the village remains a useful boundary for the community in this study due to the way social ties are maintained in the Velondriake region [53]. Additionally, the importance of elders' voices and those of men are elevated over others. Power dynamics exist within all communities. It is impossible to remove all bias borne from social interactions. By assuming we can, we simply heap Western systems of bias on top of local power imbalances [41,103]. In the pilot test of this toolkit, we separated focus groups by gender and age class as it is standard practice in qualitative research [104,105] and local coauthors agreed with the method. When implementing this toolkit elsewhere, we suggest working with local representatives to identify how focus groups should be split.

(b) . Limitations

As outlined above, this toolkit is not intended to replace existing frameworks or to serve as the only instrument to aid co-production. We recommend this toolkit be used as an initial framework (rather than an endpoint) for investigating potential obstacles and assessing programme feasibility. However, not all scientific studies require the same degree of co-production or stepping-aside. This toolkit serves as an entry point for dialogue with community members and can contribute to building the foundation of a larger relationship that benefits all parties. These conversations, guided by ethical principles and social science methodologies, are valuable for long-term community engagement that is principally grounded in the priorities, boundaries, and relational expectations of individuals from partnering communities. Academics and practitioners looking to implement this toolkit in a community they are not a part of should strongly consider the most appropriate role for them to take within project management (if any) beyond discussion facilitation.

It's important to consider that data collection on concepts unrelated to the community's interests and well-being may not need the same level of community collaboration as a development project meant to benefit the community and achieve conservation goals. Given this, users of this toolkit should first consult with community leaders about the degree of participation they feel is appropriate given the nature of the work. A community may not want to engage in this dialogue and may not want an intervention at all—respecting this is part of respecting community autonomy. It goes without saying that if and when these processes unfold, scientists should take care to be deferential, respectful, and considerate of the community's own time, energy and priorities. As such, this toolkit is as tailored to the community as possible. We recommend that future implementation expands the stepwise exploration of material access by repeating the process for each key item or resource, rather than asking them together as we did. We strongly recommend that future users sort FGD B-generated barriers into the main domains (e.g. skills, pragmatics) and include these in the survey. These domains may be adapted into other participatory and visual methods of engagement based on fit for the target community. That community engagement takes too much time or that a researcher sees themselves as unsuited to engage with communities are two common excuses, but there is no valid excuse to not engage with local communities on issues that directly affect them.

Furthermore, this contribution to the larger body of participatory development literature neither represents a validated psychometric of agency nor is it supported by quasi-experimental design. This does not represent a means of workshopping an externally proposed initiative or ongoing intervention that does not have community support. This tool should only be used to explore problems that the community has identified or has agreed are priorities, rather than top-down interventions. This tool is not intended to evaluate the post hoc effectiveness of a completed project (for commentaries on this see: [106,107]). Lastly, it is important to note that this toolkit is but one step in the process of designing and implementing projects with communities and should be used to complement some of the additional processes cited in this publication.

(c) . Why this toolkit?

A strength of this tool is that it combines focus groups (which generate open-ended insights and categorical data on community priorities from a limited number of individuals) with large-scale randomized surveys (which gather cross-sectional quantitative feedback from the population). This is designed to reach members of the community who may have not been selected for the initial focus group and gain a wider subset of feedback that crosses intersectional identities (by targeting different ages, genders and relevant subpopulations). Given this, the focus groups and survey instruments in this tool are mutually illuminative. The Focus Group Discussion on Aspirations (FGD A) assesses the communities' perceptions of the problems they face related to climate change and biodiversity loss. It explores, among other topics, how the community understands both driving mechanisms behind and adaptive strategies for these problems. Participants are encouraged to take a deep dive into one solution per focus group session. The most frequently mentioned solution becomes the focus of the next Focus Group Discussion on Barriers (FGD B), which is used to probe participants for Specific, Measurable, Assignable, Realistic and Time-relevant (SMART) steps that become the basis of the survey's stepwise assessment [108]. Comments from FGD B should also inform which spaces and resources are crucial to the project, and what barriers outside the provided list are of concern to community members. Taken together, focus groups elucidate where external involvement is most needed (if at all) and effective. The Agency Interview (a quantitative survey) asks these questions across a larger subset of the overall population, to gauge interest in and barriers to participation in the novel project idea.

Finally, this toolkit and its findings reflect the goals of leading decolonizing ecology theory by providing a straightforward template for researchers to engage with local experts and to develop community-led solutions [109–112]. Researchers should not expect to gain a nuanced understanding of community desires and goals using this tool, nor does it replace long-lasting community-researcher collaboration. Rather, it simply provides a method for the expedited identification of a feasible and community-supported livelihood venture from which to grow long-term collaboration. For change to be adaptive, it must be transformational. Too often, development projects are lauded for making incremental changes, but in reality, they do little to materially change outcomes for the community [113]. With this project, we seek to facilitate communities defining and making transformative changes for themselves.

6. Conclusion

Anthropogenic climate change increasingly threatens global ecosystems and the LID communities depending on them. LID communities have historically been left behind in the pursuit of so-called progress. Community-led conservation projects support adaptation to climate change by respecting community knowledge and autonomy and enabling communities to lead the development of the lifestyle changes they will be enacting. These communities will most directly be affected by climate change and have been most directly harmed by the lasting effects of colonization. Conservation and community development projects not prioritizing local knowledge, needs, and goals in the design and implementation stage risk reproducing hegemonic power structures. This project is one of a suite of projects which offer actionable and accessible anthropological toolkits to foster better socio-ecological outcomes in conservation research and practice. We designed this set of focus group discussions and an individual survey to facilitate community-led project development at two junctures: (1) to guide idea generation around solutions for a community-identified problem; or (2) to refine an ongoing project to integrate community feedback. It provides a template for scientists and practitioners to engage with local experts and co-produce development solutions that respect local histories and knowledge. Much like any development project, policy should be produced in conversation with communities. Public comment periods are the norm for policy development in developed nations; likewise, policies related to natural resource use and land access should receive ongoing feedback from ideation through to implementation.

Ethics

Before the project, authors met with community leaders to introduce the project and ask for their input in creating a tool to guide conversations on conservation and climate change adaptation initiatives. We explained both our desire for and ability to incorporate their feedback directly into the tool itself, as well as the desire to pilot the tool in the community. After gaining initial feedback and approval, we introduced these same study aims to all members of the focus group, who acted to disseminate this information to the broader community. Tools were translated into the local Vezo dialect of Malagasy, and back-translated to ensure correct meanings and cultural relevance of all questions.

For focus groups, G.M. and R.S. extended invitations to men and women in the community by visiting every household in Andavadoaka. Upon invitation, we informed participants that attendance was fully voluntary and that declining engagement in the study would not affect their relationship with the Morombe Archaeological Project or any of its affiliates. Every person who was willing to participate was selected for the focus groups. At the start of each focus group, we obtained informed oral consent and communicated to participants that they could withdraw at any point during the study, leave a discussion or interview early, or skip any questions they did not feel comfortable answering without affecting the compensation for their time or their relationship with the researchers. We received consent to audio-record focus groups. Members were provided with refreshments and compensation equivalent to USD 7 (based on a local average wage of 30 000 Ariary per day, yielding approximately $1 per hour of engagement with this project).

Data accessibility

Anonymized quantitative data and all R code required to replicate our analyses are available from the Dryad Digital Repository: https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.0vt4b8h4n [114]. This is part of the Climate Change Adaptation Needs a Science of Culture data portal from the Dryad Digital Repository: https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.bnzs7h4h4 [115]. Additional materials, including the ODK input for the English-Malagasy (Vezo dialect) version of our survey and MS Word documents for focus group guidelines, can be found in the electronic supplementary material [116].

Declaration of AI use

We have not used AI-assisted technologies in creating this article.

Authors' contributions

D.C.B.: conceptualization, data curation, formal analysis, investigation, methodology, project administration, software, validation, visualization, writing—original draft, writing—review and editing; K.E.T.T.: conceptualization, data curation, formal analysis, investigation, methodology, project administration, software, validation, visualization, writing—original draft, writing—review and editing; D.R.: resources, writing—original draft, writing—review and editing; S.B.: methodology, resources, validation, writing—original draft, writing—review and editing; G.M.: conceptualization, investigation, methodology, resources, validation; R.S.: investigation, methodology, validation; F.L.: investigation, methodology, validation; C.J.B.M.: investigation, methodology, validation; J.Y.A.: investigation, methodology, validation; J.R.F.T.: investigation, methodology, validation; R.M.R.: investigation, methodology, validation; H.L.: investigation, methodology, validation; T.R.: project administration, resources; K.D.: funding acquisition, resources, supervision, writing—review and editing.

All authors gave final approval for publication and agreed to be held accountable for the work performed therein.

Conflict of interest declaration

We declare we have no competing interests.

Funding

This work was funded by KD through Columbia University.