A healthy national park system should have well-designed financial management and sustainable funding mechanisms in place. Drawing on the experience of the National Park Administration in the United States, this project will help China develop a financially viable national park system that protects its rich biodiversity and inspires national pride of Chinese citizens.
Led by Jonathan Jarvis, the 18th Director of the U.S. National Park Service, this project will analyze the existing funding structure of the protected areas system at the national and provincial levels, and conduct a funding needs analysis for the pilot national parks. Based on the successful experience of the U.S National Park Service, the team will design a customized scorecard to determine the funding needs, and then explore ways to build funding channels and mechanisms to sustainably finance different management and operation activities of the national parks. The findings and recommendations from this project will be the first stepping stone for China to move toward building a well-designed financial management system and sustainable funding mechanisms for the national park and protected area system.