Parks Victoria evaluates the effectiveness of our park management activities in parks across the state through our State of the Parks (SoP) program.

The purpose of SoP is to:

• Undertake a systematic evaluation of the outcomes of management programs and the extent to which park management objectives are being met
• Review our achievements, highlight current challenges and identify emerging issues
• Inform and adapt our management programs following the review.

SoP is consistent with state and national priorities for evaluation and reporting through the Victorian Government Land and Biodiversity White Paper and the Commonwealth Government National Reserve System guidelines for the states and territories.

How it works

The process for SoP is based around best-practice adopted by the World Commission on Protected Areas. These assessments are now being undertaken by a number of park agencies around the world.

SoP assesses all park management output areas:

• Environment, land and water
• Culture and heritage
• Visitors and community
• Fire and emergency management
• A sustainable organisation

SoP is based on a broad range of indicator groups:

• Representation of park values
• Planning
• Resources
• Information
• Management response
• Management outcomes

These indicator groups each have detailed indicators and measures.

Evaluation

Parks Victoria uses a two tiered approach in evaluating our management effectiveness:

• Assess around 95 per cent of the parks network via a systematic staff survey. A range of information sources (corporate datasets, commissioned studies, monitoring reports and expert/ranger opinion) inform responses to the survey 
• Targeted quantitative monitoring programs for a sub-set of parks. In 2007, Parks Victoria published our second State of the Parks report (the first report was in 2000).

Download the latest reports

State of the Parks 2007 - summary (PDF 6.7MB)

State of the Parks 2007 - part one (PDF 12.0MB)

State of the Parks 2007 - part two (PDF 11.9MB)