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In
April 2013, the US National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) announced that it would
stop funding its Native Plant Conservation Initiative (NPCI). The Foundation,
which was created by Congress to give grants for conservation-related projects,
cited a “lack of operating funds” as the reason for NPCI’s immediate termination.1
“National
Fish and Wildlife Foundation — like many other nonprofits, local, state, and government
agencies — is affected by the federal government sequester,” explained Cheryl
Irwin, the Foundation’s vice president of communications (email, July 18,
2013). “This, in combination with the lack of management funds for this program,
contributed to the decision by NFWF.”
Established in 1995 by NFWF and a consortium of federal agencies and
non-governmental groups called the Plant Conservation Alliance (PCA), NPCI
received most of its funding from the Bureau of Land Management, US Fish and
Wildlife Service, and the US Department of Agriculture’s Forest Service. During
its 15 years of operation, NPCI distributed around $7 million — in addition to
about $12 million in matching funds — to help support more than 300 projects aimed
at addressing one of the six national core strategies for native plant
conservation: partnerships, education, restoration, research, sustainability,
and creating data linkages.
Many of the projects funded by NPCI dealt with the
conservation of important medicinal species. World Wildlife Fund and TRAFFIC,
for example, obtained NPCI funding to identify at-risk
native medicinal plants in US wildlands and to make recommendations for their
long-term conservation, said Olivia Kwong of PCA (email, July 22-23, 2013). Further, NPCI awarded a
grant to the nonprofit United Plant Savers to develop conservation and
management techniques for Appalachian populations of goldenseal (Hydrastis canadensis), black cohosh (Actaea racemosa), and bloodroot (Sanguinaria canadensis), all of which
are native, at-risk medicinal plants. Another NPCI-supported project by the
Coevolution Institute researched, produced, and published five fact sheets on
the conservation of at-risk North American medicinal plants and their
associated pollinators.
Additional
projects that received NPCI funding over the years include Seeds
of Success
(SOS), a national collaboration that has increased the quality and quantity of
native plant seeds and materials stored and distributed for research and development
purposes and use in ecosystem restoration. Another by the Chicago Botanic
Garden produced a final report on the
nation’s plant science capacity, which “revealed severe shortages of botanists at
government agencies, a wave of upcoming retirements, and an alarming decline in
botanical degree programs and course offerings at the nation’s colleges and
universities,” said Kwong and Megan Haidet, curator
for the SOS National Collection (email, July 23, 2013). Other years’ grants enabled projects such as
the restoration of native plants in Grand Canyon National Park, the investigation
of the effects of land development on herbaceous plant communities in New York,
and the assessment of present and future effects of climate change on cactus
species in the Southeastern United States.
Conservation
programs such as those supported by NPCI are direly needed because native
plants — which
are threatened by habitat loss, climate change,
invasive species, over-collection, pollinator collapse, and wildfire and other
natural disasters — play a crucial role in maintaining healthy ecosystems.
“Simply put,” said Haidet and Kwong, “native
plants assist in the absorption of air pollutants, water retention, flood
prevention, filtration, erosion prevention, food availability, and fire cycles —
often in ways that are specific to a region. Native ecosystems evolve over long
periods of time and the plants and communities that make up these ecosystems
often develop interdependent relationships. Native plant
communities provide habitat and food for other native species. Native plants
provide a substrate for growth of certain bacteria
and algae that are responsible for nutrient cycling and organic degradation.
Decaying plant matter supplies fixed organic carbon and food for microbes, and
these microbes can help plants adapt to extreme conditions particular to an
area. Plants also contribute to the water cycle by returning water to the
atmosphere through evapotranspiration. Plants native to a region are adapted
to its soils and climate, allowing them to thrive without added fertilizer,
water, or winter protection. Native plants combat invasives and lower
landscaping maintenance in urban areas.”
With NPCI’s
termination, no grant proposals will be accepted in 2013. Grants issued in previous years,
including those funded in 2012, will continue through their specified period.
“The
elimination of NPCI will be felt by the botanical community, especially since
we are in a difficult budgetary time for academic institutions, federal
agencies, and non-profit organization[s] alike,” said Haidet and Kwong.
“National level projects to coordinate the efforts mentioned above will also be
hurt by the elimination of these funds.”
According
to a notice posted by PCA on the Medicinal Plant Working Group list serve, NPCI
had been “a great source of funding for native and rare plants, which get less
than 2% of recovery dollars under the Endangered Species Act and less than 2%
of federal biological research dollars.” In fact, NPCI was created to address
the very issue of limited funding for plant conservation projects. The need for
such assistance is apparent when considering that most grant applications
submitted to NPCI requested much more money than was available. “Since 2009,
for example, more than 100 NPCI pre-proposals were received annually and
averaged $7,000,000 in requests, while the annual funding allocated to the
Program averaged $400,000.”1
“There are few sources of funding for the conservation
of native plants,” said Haidet and Kwong. “The NPCI grant program was one of
the only national programs focused on the conservation benefits of native
plants. Many state and local native plant societies offer small conservation
grants, but these are typically $1,000-$2,000 instead of $10,000 and up (the
average grant size for the life of the NPCI grant program was $23,084).”
NFWF
maintains that it will continue to address native plant issues through its
other programs and initiatives.
“The National Fish and Wildlife Foundation
recognizes the critical importance that native and rare plants hold in
ecosystems and habitat,” said Irwin. “The retirement of the NPCI program is not
an end to native plant conservation at NFWF; this work will continue through
other initiatives within the Foundation. Considerations are currently being
made to specifically identify native and rare species to direct resources
towards conservation efforts. Also, NFWF recognizes that native and rare
species contribute to the habitat of other species, so a holistic and landscape
level approach to conservation within programs will incorporate efforts for
their protection and restoration.”
A
list of alternative sources of funding for native plant projects is available here.
—Lindsay Stafford Mader
References 1. Funding: Native Plant Conservation Initiative grant
program cancelled [press release]. Washington, DC: Plant Conservation Alliance.
July 15, 2013. Available here. Accessed July 23, 2013. |