Profile
I am currently a postdoctoral research fellow with the International Forestry Resources and Institutes (IFRI) at the University of Michigan. I am interested in mechanisms that may act to achieve the dual goals of conservation and poverty alleviation in tropical forest regions, and am working in collaboration with the Center for Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) to study the effectiveness of such mechanisms at the forest-farm frontier.
Biography
My PhD, based at the University of East Anglia, UK, aimed to understand how extractive reserves (legally-inhabited protected areas) can contribute to the conservation of biodiversity and environmental services whilst positively influencing the development of rural livelihoods. My research, based in the western Brazilian Amazon, focussed on:
i) describing and explaining patterns of resource use amongst rural Amazonian communities
ii) the potential for commercial extraction of non-timber forest products (NTFPs), such as the medicinal oleoresin produced by the tree genus Copaifera
iii) the importance of programme design in the implementation of payments for environmental services (PES) programmes, focussing on the Amazonas-wide Bolsa Floresta.
My work examined a range of the issues involved, from resource abundance to socio-economic appraisal, and drew on both natural and social science research methods. In collaboration with government agencies and NGOs, we developed management protocols for promoting sustainable NTFP harvesting within the context of extractive reserves.
Publications
Newton, P., Endo, W. & Peres, C.A. 2012. Determinants of livelihood strategy variation in two extractive reserves in Amazonian flooded and unflooded forest. Environmental Conservation. DOI: 10.1017/s0376892911000580
Newton, P., Nichols, E.S., Endo, W. & Peres, C.A. 2012. Consequences of actor level livelihood heterogeneity for additionality in an undifferentiated payment-based payments for environmental services programme in a tropical forest region. Global Environmental Change, 22: 127-136
Newton, P., Watkinson, A.R. & Peres, C.A. 2011. Determinants of yield in a non-timber forest product: Copaifera oleoresin in Amazonian extractive reserves. Forest Ecology & Management 261: 255-264
Newton, P., Nguyen Van T., Roberton, S. & Bell, D. 2008. Pangolins in peril: using hunters’ knowledge to conserve elusive species in Vietnam. Endangered Species Research 6: 41-53
Duckworth, J.W., Steinmitz, R., Anak Pattanavibool, Than Zaw, Do Tuoc & Newton, P. 2008. Manis pentadactyla. In: IUCN 2008. 2008 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species < www.iucnredlist.org> Duckworth, J.W., Anak Pattanavibool, Newton, P. & Nguyen Van Nhuan 2008. Manis javanica. In: IUCN 2008. 2008 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species < www.iucnredlist.org>
Nguyen, V.T., Newton, P., Roberton, S., Bell, D. & Clark, V.L. 2008. Tapping into local knowledge to help conserve pangolins in Vietnam. Proceedings of the workshop on trade and conservation of pangolins native to South and Southest Asia: 163.
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