Does It Work for Biodiversity? Experiences and Challenges in the Evaluation of Social Marketing Campaigns

Abstract

There is a growing realization among conservationists that human behavior is the main driver of all key threats to biodiversity and the environment. This realization has led to an escalation of the efforts to influence human behavior toward the adoption of more sustainable alternatives, more recently through the use of social marketing theory and tools. However, these initiatives have traditionally suffered from a lack of robust impact evaluation, which limits not only accountability but also a practitioner’s ability to learn and improve over time. We evaluated three social marketing campaigns conducted in the Philippines, which aimed at increasing the sustainability of local fisheries. To achieve this, we used the results not only from questionnaire surveys but also from biological and enforcement data. We found that although there is some evidence of impact around human behavior and perceptions of conservation results, those changes did not translate into biological outcomes during the 2-year time frame considered in this evaluation. We discuss many of the barriers to causal inference that still remain, particularly if causal links between outcomes and specific interventions are to be drawn, but also showcase how this current methodology can help us go further than the more basic approaches to impact evaluation commonly used. Lastly, we highlight a number of lessons learned from this experience in seeking a practical, ethical, and effective approach to impact evaluation.