Terrestrial Protected Areas and Food Security: A Systematic Review of Research Approaches

Abstract

Achieving food security is one of the most important sustainable development goals and is a major global concern, specifically in remote and rural areas of the developing world where high biodiversity can be found and many protected areas are located. The goals of food security and biodiversity conservation are two of the most critical challenges of our time. This study aims to better understand the state of research on protected areas and food security through a methodological lens. The literature search was conducted in the Web of Science core collection and the Centre for Agriculture and Biosciences International (CAB) abstracts database. The search results indicate that this is an understudied topic with only nineteen articles published in various research domains. The findings reveal that studies were explanatory research rather than confirmatory and most studies had a snapshot design with no control or baseline. National parks were the main category of protected areas reported in studies. Data collection commonly employed a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods at a household level. We also found that spatial data and methods are important yet underutilized.