Common use of CONSERVATION STRATEGY AND COMMITMENTS Clause in Contracts

CONSERVATION STRATEGY AND COMMITMENTS. The strategy for organizing a cooperative, range-wide approach to gopher tortoise management and conservation is focused on establishing a baseline of conservation commitments that all Parties agree to, and then collectively accounting for specific agency conservation actions across the region. It also establishes a starting-point for private landowner involvement in gopher tortoise conservation and management activities. Key components of this strategy are based on the premise that this Agreement, in the near term, is focused on reducing the deteriorating status of the species by improving, organizing, and implementing specific management actions, and in the long term, will facilitate the development of a network of managed gopher tortoise populations across its range. The commitment and actions outlined in this Section focus on conservation, improvement, and ongoing management of gopher tortoise habitat. The landscape and local level conservation actions are designed to be adaptable and implementable by all Parties in a collaborative environment, and the agency-specific actions describe the specific actions that each Party will conduct to effectively manage the species and reduce habitat and population loss. The results of these actions will be observed through monitoring the response of tortoise populations. Information obtained from surveys and monitoring will increase the understanding of the gopher tortoise and its management needs. This knowledge will be applied using the concepts of Adaptive Management that periodically assess and modify conservation actions.