Blog post by Pin Pravalprukskul and Juan José Egas. “When can nature pay for biodiversity conservation? Can local communities prosper by protecting wildlife?“ These questions were raised by keynote speaker Miroslav Zámečník during today’s opening plenary session. Mr. Zámečník is an economist at Boston Venture Central Europe with extensive experience in financial consultancy at national and international levels. But today, we saw his life-long love for wildlife merging with his professional career, when he discussed how nature could be conserved from an economic approach. Mr. Zámečník is interested in the creation of the right kind of incentives for each conservation case. For example, Nepal’s Chitwan National Park prohibits poaching of the Great One-Horned Rhino, and local communities play a role in restricting illegal access to the park, along with the army and park guards. The communities earn half of the park proceeds and also benefit from increased tourism in the area. On the other hand, in Pakistan, all big game hunting is illegal except for a very limited number of permits through which hunters are allowed access to rare trophy animals such as the Markhor. As 80% of all revenue goes to local communities, they have been greatly involved in preventing poaching, with visible results in wildlife preservation. Although these two cases employ very different mechanisms, they have both been successful in addressing the wildlife conservation challenges posed. Mr. Zámečník might have left us with the feeling that there is no one-size-fits-all solution, but he also reminded us that regardless of the method, measures tend to be more sustainable when the community holds a stake in the preservation of wildlife. Watch Mr. Zámečník talk more about his views on “thinking outside of the box” for successful conservation in the interview below.