This article addresses the challenge of combining ecosystem protection with economic development. The setting is societies living near a national park in a poor and peripheral part of Indonesia. Data from our household survey are used to answer the following questions: Do local communities find secure and sustainable livelihoods in areas surrounding the park? To what extent do communities close to the park contribute to ecosystem protection? We use cluster analysis to group households based on a mapping of livelihood means and outcomes. In-depth interviews complement the statistical data. The study reveals prevailing and widespread poverty combined with non-sustainable livelihoods. It shows that people’s traditional lives may pose a risk, rather than the solution, to ecosystem protection, and that sustained biodiversity and pristine forests may not be consistent with maintaining an economic resource base for an increasing population. Further, that ecosystem degradation does not necessarily evoke traditional social mechanisms for nature protection.

本文解决了将生态系统保护与经济发展相结合的挑战。背景是生活在印度尼西亚贫困和周边地区国家公园附近的社会。我们的家庭调查数据用于回答以下问题：当地社区是否在公园周边地区找到安全和可持续的生计？公园附近的社区在多大程度上为生态系统保护做出了贡献？我们使用聚类分析，根据生计方式和结果的映射对家庭进行分组。深度访谈补充了统计数据。该研究揭示了普遍存在的普遍贫困以及不可持续的生计。它表明人们的传统生活可能对生态系统保护构成风险，而不是解决方案，持续的生物多样性和原始森林可能与为不断增长的人口维持经济资源基础不一致。此外，生态系统退化并不一定会唤起传统的自然保护社会机制。