The establishment of protected areas in Myanmar's Kachin State offers a cautionary tale about top-down conservation approaches that fail to integrate local communities. Beginning in the 1990s, the Wildlife Conservation Society partnered with Myanmar's Forest Department to establish a network of protected areas, including the 3,800 sq km Hkakabo Razi National Park (in 1998), the 2,700 sq km Hponkan Razi Wildlife Sanctuary (in 2003), and the 21,000 sq km Hukawng Valley – designated as the world's largest tiger reserve in 2010. These areas were designed to prevent hunting of rare and threatened animals such as bears and tigers, in demand for bear bile and trophies. Despite these impressive designations on paper, wildlife populations have dramatically declined, revealing a fundamental disconnect between conservation intentions and outcomes. Local residents report that when these areas were established, traditional sustainable practices like seasonal hunting restrictions were abandoned as communities lost their sense of stewardship. "In the past, our people had their own land where they could manage the environment and wildlife," explained a Rawang resident from Hkakabo Razi. "After Hkakabo Razi was designated a national park, those groups told the local people that they no longer owned the land. Since then, hunting has become uncontrollable." The parks' creation failed to consider traditional resource management systems or alternative livelihoods, as one environmental activist noted: "When the government tried to conserve the forest and wildlife, they didn't consider the local community's livelihoods. The case demonstrates how conservation approaches that exclude Indigenous stewardship can inadvertently accelerate biodiversity loss by breeding resentment and undermining traditional practices that once regulated sustainable resource use.