1. Redistribution of use in direction of the future (Ciriacy-Wantrup, 1968)
2. All those actions which are directed towards sustaining otherwise decreasing rates of use, towards sustained yield management, or towards increasing a sustained use (Ciriacy-Wantrup. 1968, p.60).
3. Of natural resources. The protection, improvement, and use of natural resources according to principles that will assure their highest economic or social benefits for man and his environment now and into the future. (Choudhury and Jensen, 1997)
As conservation can be considered the mean to maintain the resource system in "desirable states", it is necessary to define what these states
are (Holt and Talbot, 1978).