Natural resource enterprises – income diversification and land conservation on privately owned lands in the United States (U.S.)

ABSTRACT

Wildlife-related recreation is popular throughout the world with Americans spending over $150 billion dollars (U.S.) annually. I have conducted educational workshops (>200 events) to train U.S. landowners in natural resource enterprise management and operations offering recreational hunting, angling, and nature tourism excursions along with conservation management practices to enhance wildlife habitats on their lands. To measure impacts from these workshops, I conducted a comprehensive mail survey study with participants since 2010. Study findings revealed that private landowners who initiated wildlife-related recreational enterprises earned annual incomes and implemented conservation practices on their lands. More targeted training for landowners is recommended to enhance income diversification on privately owned lands and to increase conservation of wildlife habitats, land stewardship, and ecosystem services (i.e., clean water, biodiversity, and conservation zones) beneficial to society.

KEYWORDS:

• natural resource enterprises
• sustainability
• wildlife and land conservation
• wildlife-related recreation

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author. The survey study described in this manuscript was deemed exempt from human subjects protection by the Office of Regulatory Compliance and Security at Mississippi State University due to the primary use of survey data was to improve landowner outreach programming conducted by the author.