Impact evaluation focuses on disentangling the effects attributable to a particular policy intervention (e.g. protected areas) on an outcome variable (e.g. deforestation) from broader changes in a region (e.g. widespread development or government policies) (Ahmadia, 2015). More generally, according to one source, the resources currently allocated to monitoring and evaluation — on average, less than 5% of a conservation project’s budget — do not come close to what is needed to satisfy the increasing demand from policymakers for more and higher-quality evidence on the impacts of conservation and development interventions (McKinnon et al., This involves the main impacts and effects resulting from the activity on the local social, economic, environmental and other development indicators.” (