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We use field data linked to satellite image analysis to examine the relationship between biodiversity loss, deforestation, and poverty around Kibale National Park (KNP) in western Uganda, 1996Uganda, -2006. Over this decade, KNP generally maintained forest cover, tree species, and primate populations, whereas neighboring communal forest patches were reduced by half and showed substantial declines in tree species and primate populations. However, a bad decade for forest outside the park proved a prosperous one for most local residents. Panel data for 252 households show substantial improvement in welfare indicators (e.g., safer water, more durable roof material), with the greatest increases found among those with highest initial assets. A combination of regression analysis and matching estimators shows that although the poor tend to be located on the park perimeter, proximity to the park has no measureable effect on growth of productive assets. The risk for land loss among the poor was inversely correlated with proximity to the park, initial farm size, and decline in adjacent communal forests. We conclude the current disproportionate presence of poor households at the edge of the park does not signal that the park is a poverty trap. Rather, Kibale appears to provide protection against desperation sales and farm loss among those most vulnerable.conservation | tropical forest | protected areas | economic development

Environmental conditional cash transfers are popular but their impacts are not well understood. We evaluate land cover and wealth impacts of a federal program that pays landowners for protecting forest. Panel data for program beneficiaries and rejected applicants allow us to control for fixed differences and time trends affecting both groups. We find the program reduces the expected land cover loss by 40–51 percent and generates small but positive poverty alleviation. Environmental gains are higher where poverty is low while household gains are higher where deforestation risk is low, illustrating the difficulty of meeting multiple policy goals with one tool. (JEL I32, I38, O13, O15, Q23, Q28, Q56)

Natural resource managers are often expected to achieve both environmental protection and economic development even when there are fundamental trade-offs between these goals. Adaptive management provides a theoretical structure for program administrators to balance social priorities in the presence