Building a Foundation for Linear Infrastructure Safeguards in Asia (LISA)
The Center for Large Landscape Conservation is pleased to announce the completion of the 14-month, USAID-funded “LISA Project” to advance wildlife-friendly linear infrastructure in Asia.
As Asia experiences unprecedented economic growth, the continent’s rich biodiversity and complex ecosystems are threatened by the rapid expansion of linear infrastructure development like roads, railways, and power lines. In 2020, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) launched their Linear Infrastructure Safeguards in Asia (LISA) Project—an assessment of the capacity of Asian countries to develop wildlife-friendly linear infrastructure. Due to the Center’s expertise in this area of conservation, including road ecology, we were selected to be the lead investigator on this project for USAID’s contractor, Perez, APC.
Twenty-four experts from seven countries formed the LISA Project team to build a base of knowledge to support Asian countries in planning wildlife safeguards for future linear infrastructure development. The project conducted its research through an in-depth literature review, a policy assessment, Asia-wide and fine-scale spatial analyses, personal interviews, an electronic survey, and the compilation of case studies.
A Final Report summarizes the key findings and recommendations and is accompanied by four in-depth Annexes describing the Capacity Assessment, Spatial Analyses, Literature Review, and Case Studies. Once completed, our team synthesized the tremendous amount of information generated by the project into six two-hour Training Modules (webinars), which received more than 600 live views. The recorded Module videos and Training Manual are available for online viewing.
A few highlights from the project include:
- Review of published literature for 28 Asian countries and assessment of capacity through 300+ electronic survey responses in five representative countries – India, Nepal, Bangladesh, Thailand, and Mongolia;
- Mapping of 80,000 kilometers of proposed linear infrastructure projects across Asia, affecting more than 350 protected areas. Of these projects, more than two-thirds will be new footprints where linear infrastructure doesn’t currently exist; and
- Compilation of 8 case studies from 7 countries on linear infrastructure projects in Asia, including 2 featuring an economic analysis.
For more information:
- LISA Project Highlights by the Numbers
- USAID LISA Project Fact Sheet
- LISA Project Webpage that houses the Final Report, its four Annexes, the six Training Module recordings accompanied by the six slide presentations from the Modules, and the Training Manual