Community-led conservation that works.

Our Mission.

To provide indigenous communities and conservation organisations the infrastructure they need to transition to just and equitable collaborative governance of the world’s protected areas.

  • Alexander Aisher, PhD.

    FOUNDER & DIRECTOR

    Environmental anthropologist and lead designer of the DecisionSeed® toolkit.

  • Vinita Damodaran, PhD.

    CONSERVATION ADVISOR

    Professor of South Asian History and Director of the Centre for World Environmental History, University of Sussex.

  • Keith Ellis

    FACILITATION LEAD & CO-DIRECTOR

    Creative facilitator, workshop designer and co-designer of the DecisionSeed® toolkit.

  • Cherry Buckwell, PhD.

    HEALTHY SYSTEMS LEAD & CO-DIRECTOR

    Medical lecturer and advisor on health in complex systems.

Who we have worked with.

  • Seva Mandir.

    Seva Mandir supports cohesive and inclusive communities through the creation of democratic forums spanning gender, socio-economic divides and castes to encourage self-governance.

  • Foundation for Ecological Security.

    The Foundation for Ecological Security is committed to strengthening, reviving, or restoring, where necessary, the process of ecological succession and the conservation of land, forest and water resources in india.

  • Kalvapriksh.

    Kalvapriksh is an Indian non profit organisation working on environmental and social issues at local, national and global levels to promote ecological sustainability and social equity.

Putting local people in the driving seat of conservation.

Roots of DecisionSeed®

  • Place-based conservation in the Global South.

    Source: Aisher & Damodaran, 2016. Conservation, Symbolism and Imagination: Human-Nature Interactions in the Global South. [access here]

  • Valuing nature—conserving the pangolin.

    Source: Aisher, 2016. Scarcity, Alterity and Value: Decline of the Pangolin, the World’s Most Trafficked Mammal. [access here]

  • Indigenous perceptions of the wild.

    Source: Aisher, 2019. Extending Perspectivism to India’s “Last Wild Place”: Hunting, Conservation, and Wildlife, and Its Flourishing and Decline, in the Eastern Himalayas. [access here]

  • The ecological value of refuge.

    Source: Aisher, 2022. How a Storm Feels: Storying Climate Change in the Eastern Himalayas. Chapter from book Cooling Down: Local Responses to Climate Change, edited by Hoffman, Eriksen and Mendes. [access here]