What is conservation? Definition, types and why it matters

Sharon Jae Hall, the conservation ecologist who teaches ASU’s introductory course, puts it simply: “I think ecology is the study of us.” 

In plain terms, conservation is the care and protection of nature so it keeps supporting life: clean water, healthy soil, steady food and the wildlife that holds it all together. 

Whether you love wildlife, worry about the planet or wonder how it all works, the ideas below can help make conservation click, and point to where you could take it next.

1. What conservation is

Picture a fruit tree. Pick the fruit each year and it feeds you for decades. Cut it down for lumber and you get one payday, then nothing. Conservation treats forests, fish and freshwater the same way: take what renews, protect what does not. Conservation is careful, managed use — that’s one side of conservation.  Wild and free is the other.

Conservation vs preservation: what is the difference?

The textbook answer goes like this: conservation means careful use, like a forest where some trees are harvested and replanted. Preservation means hands off, like a wilderness area closed to logging and development.

You can see the split on any map. A national park is managed mainly to protect ecological functions and cultural values, while a national forest right next door is managed for many uses at once, including timber, grazing, recreation and wildlife. Same landscape, two ways of caring for it.

Sharon Jae Hall, the ASU conservation ecologist who teaches this course, treats that old contrast with respect. She has spent a career studying how ecosystems hold together, and she’ll tell you it’s a fair place to begin. “This is what the textbooks say,” she says, “but the distinction is a little bit tired. The modern field of conservation has moved past this, aiming for a future where nature and humanity thrive together.”

That larger idea is already taking shape. “Some want half-Earth for nature,” Sharon says, a push to set aside half the planet. Many countries are aiming for even 30% of lands and waters conserved by 2030, the 30 by 30 pledge from the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework. As she puts it, “the field of conservation now asks us to see people, wildlife, air, water and land as part of one connected future.'”

For Dr. Hall, the question that matters runs deeper than any label. How much of the living world do we protect, and do we protect it alongside the communities who know that land best? That, she says, is where humility comes in. Nature has been holding itself together far longer than we have studied it, and the wisest conservation listens before it acts.

2. Types of conservation

Most conservation falls into a few overlapping types:

• Biodiversity and wildlife conservation protect plants, animals and other living things and their habitats
• Water conservation keeps freshwater clean and available to support life.
• Soil conservation stops erosion and keeps land able to grow healthy ecosystems and food.
• Marine conservation protects oceans and coastlines.
• Land conservation protects the health of  forests, grasslands, deserts, and open space.

Protect one and you usually protect the rest. When we protect a forest and its watershed, and when we allow it room to adapt to new conditions, we also help protect wildlife, soil, clean water and the people who depend on them. This kind of conservation shows how connected ecosystems are, and why protecting nature takes long-term care.

3. Why conservation matters

Healthy ecosystems do unpaid work that keeps daily life possible. Forests and wetlands filter rain and refill the wells and taps you drink from. Pollinators like bees support about one in three bites of food you eat, according to the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service. Forests, grasslands and oceans pull carbon from the air and steady the weather. Stop that work and the bill arrives fast: dry wells, failed crops, empty fisheries. The people who live closest to these systems feel it first, which is why the best conservation puts local communities in charge. In southern Kenya, for example, community conservancies run by residents have seen lion numbers double while 3,000 households earn more than $4 million a year from conservation.

Prevention is also the cheaper path. A collapsed fishery, an eroded hillside or a polluted aquifer costs a fortune to repair, if it can be repaired at all. Protecting these systems before they break costs far less than fixing them after. That math makes one case for conservation.

There’s a second case, and it’s equally valid. Nature has worth of its own, apart from anything it does for people. Dr. Hall sets the two side by side: the services argument holds, and so does the idea that a forest, a river or a wolf matters simply because it exists. Many people hold this view. Many Indigenous peoples understand plants and animals as relatives, as kin. Scientists have names for these lenses, ecocentrism and kincentrism, and they stand alongside clean water and steady weather as reasons that conservation matters.

Conservation is a cause and a career

The field needs more than people who love the outdoors, and it is a working job market with doors at every level. Native plant nursery growers, wildlife care technicians, rangeland health experts and local plant and wildlife guides all keep conservation running, and people who carry deep, long-term knowledge of a place often bring exactly what the work needs.

On the ground, the work also looks like rangers tracking where wildlife and livestock cross paths, carbon-project staff who help fund protected forests and data teams mapping where people and animals overlap. It needs writers, policy specialists, engineers and community leaders too.

How far you go depends on how far you want to. The roles that lead projects, direct the science and shape policy across whole regions, the ones with the most reach and the highest pay, usually run through a college degree. In the US, about 28,500 people work as conservation scientists at a median $67,950 a year. A degree opens that tier of the field, and it keeps opening doors long after the first one.

And you don’t have to decide today. ASU’s Introduction to Conservation is open to anyone with no prerequisites. You take the full course for $25, and if you like your grade you pay $400 to put the credit on an ASU transcript, where it can ladder toward a degree. You can start with one course and see how it fits.

What can one person do?

Plenty, and you can start now. Conservation is the sum of small, steady acts that add up. Join a community science project and log the birds, bugs and plants in your area, the kind of data researchers use. Volunteer with a local park, a river cleanup or a wildlife group. Learn how one ecosystem near you works, then share what you find.

None of that needs a title or a degree, only your attention. Your interest counts whatever shape it takes, and the work needs your specific version of it. If you want that interest to open professional doors, the most direct step is a class.

ASU offers a conservation course for $25, where you choose to add credit for $400 only if you like your grade

That class can start right here, and if you think a degree might be up your alley, it is a low-risk way to test the idea. ASU’s Introduction to Conservation (CNV 194) is one of ASU’s online Universal Learner Courses open to anyone, with no prerequisites. 

You enroll for $25 and take the full eight-week course. If you like your grade, you pay $400 to put the credit on an ASU transcript, and it can ladder toward a degree. 

Decide it is not for you, and you walk away having learned something, out only $25. Register at ulc.asu.edu.

Frequently asked questions

What is the simplest definition of conservation?

Conservation is protecting and managing nature so it stays healthy and keeps supporting life.

What is the goal of conservation?

The goal is to keep nature healthy enough to support life over the long term, for wildlife and for the people who share the same land and water.

Why is conservation important?

Conservation keeps clean water, food and a stable climate flowing, and it protects the wildlife we share the planet with. It matters for another reason too: forests, rivers, oceans, wildlife and people are part of one living system, and many of those species have value for their own sake, apart from what they give us. Protecting these systems before they break also costs far less than repairing them after.

What are the main types of conservation?

The main types are biodiversity, wildlife, water, soil, marine and land conservation. They overlap, so protecting one habitat often protects several at once.

What are examples of conservation?

Examples include protecting an endangered species, restoring a wetland, creating a marine reserve, helping a community fund and manage the wildlife on its own land, harvesting some timber from a forest while replanting it and sharing knowledge and care of nature with others.

Do you need a science degree to work in conservation?

No. Conservation needs scientists, and it also needs writers, designers, coders, artists, policy specialists and community organizers. You do not have to pick a major to begin, and a single course is enough to start finding where you fit.

Can I study conservation online?

Yes. ASU’s Introduction to Conservation (CNV 194) is open to anyone, with no prerequisites and a $25 starting cost. It runs about eight weeks online and offers 3 credits if you choose to add official ASU credit.

Conservation is a way of seeing the world that turns into work people do every day, in careers, in the outdoors, in cities and in communities everywhere. If you want to keep exploring, the Conservation Futures Academy covers the field in more depth, and ASU’s Introduction to Conservation is open whenever you are ready to start.

Ready to start? Here’s who you’d learn from

Sharon Jae Hall, the conservationist quoted above, teaches this course. A President’s Professor in ASU’s School of Life Sciences, she studies ecosystem resilience and how people and nature shape each other near protected areas, the exact terrain the course covers. She trained at Stanford, Harvard and Berkeley, and she is one of ASU’s Senior Global Futures Scientists. She recently served as associate dean of the Rob Walton College of Global Futures.

You would be learning from a working scientist who still counts teaching as the best part of the job. “It’s during the times that I’m teaching that I feel most alive and most hopeful,” she says. 

ASU’s Introduction to Conservation is open whenever you are ready, and the Conservation Futures Academy is there when you want to go further.

Image credit: Courtesy of Dr. Sharon Jae Hall. ASU President’s Professor Dr. Hall gently holds a fluffy Wedge-tailed Shearwater chick (‘Ua‘u kani) during a coastal wildlife monitoring check. By carefully monitoring the health of these underground burrow-nesting seabirds, conservationists can track the overall health of the surrounding marine and coastal ecosystems.