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Identify primary interests for both nature and people.

Pri­ma­ry inter­ests rep­re­sent what the con­ser­va­tion orga­ni­za­tion, influ­en­tial actors, and impor­tant stake­hold­ers care about in the con­text of the socio-eco­log­i­cal sys­tem. For the Con­ser­van­cy, pri­ma­ry inter­ests begin with con­ser­va­tion tar­gets (e.g. species of con­cern [endan­gered species], habi­tats, eco­log­i­cal process­es [e.g.,water qual­i­ty reg­u­la­tion, evo­lu­tion, cli­mate adap­ta­tion, etc.]). Con­ser­van­cy staff should keep in mind the orga­ni­za­tion­al ori­en­ta­tion of aim­ing to achieve sys­temic change when select­ing con­ser­va­tion tar­gets as this will like­ly influ­ence the num­ber and types of tar­gets chosen.

At this stage the pur­pose is to iden­ti­fy all rel­e­vant inter­ests for all involved. Pri­ma­ry inter­ests of oth­er orga­ni­za­tions or stake­hold­er groups should also be includ­ed in terms pro­vid­ed by or accept­ed by these groups. These are like­ly to reflect a broad set of human inter­ests (e.g. employ­ment, income, food secu­ri­ty, edu­ca­tion, equal­i­ty, access to resources, cul­tur­al sites, polit­i­cal instability/conflict/crime, urban growth, busi­ness oppor­tu­ni­ties). All iden­ti­fied as key pri­ma­ry inter­ests should be includ­ed in the sit­u­a­tion analy­sis. The point of the analy­sis is to iden­ti­fy which of these pri­ma­ry inter­ests are strong­ly con­nect­ed to con­ser­va­tion interests.

Broad­ly defin­ing pri­ma­ry inter­ests ear­ly in the process allows rep­re­sen­ta­tion of impor­tant val­ues held by all key stake­hold­ers that pro­vide oppor­tu­ni­ties for iden­ti­fy­ing links or trade-offs between them.