The Universal Ranger Support Alliance (URSA) launched a Global Action Plan to improve ranger working conditions and welfare, while at the same time building trusting relationships with communities and ensuring the responsible conduct of rangers. With this Action Plan, URSA committed to developing a global safeguarding framework that establishes principles for conduct and specifies mechanisms for reporting and investigating breaches of the policy and how to deal with them. AAE was hired to contribute to the development of this global safeguarding framework by developing Social Safeguarding Principles that improve the working environment for rangers and protect the communities they get in contact with, as well as the rangers themselves, and a manual for the use of these principles that can be adapted in any language and geography.
Activities included:
- A desk study as a basis for developing the main outputs by generating an in-depth understanding of the current status of information and guidance available for rangers in the context of social safeguards.
- A scoping workshop to present the gained understanding to a broad range of stakeholders and jointly determine and define the adequate scope and coverage of the main outputs.
- Development of main outputs based on the previous activities.
- A second workshop to present the outputs and receive further feedback for incorporation into the final version of the outputs.
Main outputs:
- A Summary Report detailing the information obtained from the literature review with regard to social safeguards specifically for rangers.
- Safeguarding Principles for Rangers, with brief guidance on the reporting mechanism and actions against misconduct.
- A user-friendly manual to accompany the Safeguarding Principles that can be adapted in any language and geography, including an adaptable template and checklist for creating a Safeguarding Policy.
- Workshop reports reflecting the main stakeholder input obtained and including a list of participants.
