By investing in ecotourism, Belize has protected more than a third of it's total land area, as well as about 13 percent of it's marine area. As a world leader in conservation, CSF's Venetia Hargreaves-Allen believes the Bahamas could learn significantly from Belize's success. Formerly the principal investigator for the Marine Managed Area Economic Valuation in Belize with Conservation International, Hargreaves-Allen turned her focus to the Bahamas in a marine management study conducted in 2010. She recently presented her findings at a public meeting at the Bahamas National Trust.

Conservation Strategy Fund's Economic Tools for Conservation training course will be offered next year in Micronesia thanks to a grant from the David and Lucile Packard Foundation and a partnership with 2010 international course graduate Willy Kostka and the Micronesian Conservation Trust (MCT). The course will be CSF's first in the Western Pacific region. The training will support conservation of marine and forest resources in Micronesia by equipping conservation practitioners, natural resource managers and community leaders with the principles and tools of conservation economics.

Dear CSF Course graduate, How has economics helped you protect nature? Have you used the tools you learned in your CSF course in your work? Tell us your story, and we will help you share it with the CSF community and the world. The author of the best story will win a brand new Apple iPad! For the full details, click here.

John Reid discusses California's Proposition 23 and what it would mean for the fate of rain forests in an op-ed featured in Santa Rosa's Press Democrat. "California has always led on environmental policy, but never in the wrong direction." To read the article, click here.

Who is CSF and how do we use economics to protect nature? Mongabay conducted an interview with CSF Founder John Reid to find out. You can click to read the article here.

Conservation Strategy Fund has launched a YouTube channel. We will feature videos on CSF projects, courses, staff and student profiles, and informational films. Please subscribe so you can stay up to date with any videos we post. http://www.youtube.com/user/numbers4nature

Watch this short video and hear from our students why they attended our 11th annual International Training in Economic Tools for Conservation at Stanford University in California in August 2009. The students came from all corners of the globe: Indonesia, Cameroon, Haiti, Bhutan, Colombia, Brazil and beyond. Watch the video, below, or by clicking here for our You Tube site.

CSF held its 2009 International Economic Tools Course from August 10-12, 2009 at Stanford University in California, USA. During the two-week course, participants learned to use economics to be more strategic and successful in their conservation work. Participants studied natural resource and environmental economics, practiced communication and negotiation techniques, and got hands-on experience with cost-benefit analysis.

CSF Founder John Reid writes an opinion piece in Santa Rosa's Press Democrat on the connection between piracy and the environment. http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20081123/OPINION05/811230377?p=1&tc=pg