During the past three decades, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and private individuals have taken the lead in protecting ecosystems around the world. One of the main contributions to conservation that they make stems from their greater flexibility, compared with that of governments. When private individuals are involved, setting up a protected area can be decided by a personal commitment. For example, entrepreneur Douglas Tompkins, who founded the clothing companies North Face and Patagonia, and media mogul Ted Turner, who launched CNN, have created protected areas around the world totaling approximately 16,000 km² (6,240 mi²)—about twice the combined areas of the U.S. states of Rhode Island and Delaware.

In the case of a nongovernmental conservation organization, a decision to allocate funds to protect an area with potential conservation value may only require a positive vote from a board of directors. There are hundreds of international and national nongovernmental conservation organizations actively working to sustain biodiversity, and they have preserved areas totaling over 2.5 million km². Some of the best known organizations include the World Wildlife Fund, Conservation International, and The Nature Conservancy.

The Nature Conservancy is a nonprofit, nongovernmental conservation organization established in 1951 to protect ecologically important areas around the world. Over the course of its more than half-century of operation, the organization has been active in the conservation of terrestrial, freshwater, and marine ecosystems, protecting nearly 500,000 km² of terrestrial ecosystems and over 8,000 kilometers of rivers. It also manages more than 100 conservation projects in the marine environment.

The Nature Conservancy originally focused on conservation in the United States and protecting critical habitat for rare and threatened species or conserving very small examples of regionally distinctive environments. Today, the organization has increasingly taken a larger-scale, more inclusive approach, emphasizing the conservation of whole ecosystems and landscapes. Wherever The Nature Conservancy operates, it strives to integrate its conservation programs with the broad economic interests of the local community, working with stakeholders ranging from academic scientists and conservationists to industrial and financial leaders. It has more than 1 million members and is active in more than 30 countries (Figure 4.27).

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The Forever Costa Rica project provides an example of how The Nature Conservancy helps protect natural areas through partnerships with governments and private individuals. Costa Rica is famous for being one of the most biologically rich spots in the world—a tiny country that is home to 5% of all species. By the early 2000s, it had set aside 25% of its land in preserves, which meant that it was closing in on one of the most important metrics under the Convention on Biodiversity.

Unfortunately, its terrestrial parks were struggling with financial survival, and the country was protecting very little of its marine diversity. In 2010 The Nature Conservancy brokered one of the largest debt-for-nature swaps with the U.S. government. A debt-for-nature swap occurs when a developed nation forgives the debt of a developing nation in exchange for conservation pledges. Under the 1998 Tropical Forest Act, for instance, the U.S. Treasury can forgive up to $20 million worth of a country’s debt each year if that country can make a case that it will use the funds to preserve a tropical forest in perpetuity. Like many developing countries, Costa Rica was indebted to the United States for loans from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). The Nature Conservancy used funds freed up from a debt-for-nature swap, combined with funds from conservation partners, to create a $56 million trust fund that could support Costa Rica’s national parks in perpetuity.