Colonial environmental management generally relied on expatriate expertise, seriously undervalued and ignored local knowledge and adopted a top–down approach. It placed concern for nature after revenue generation through export crops or mineral resources. Resource exploitation and resource accounting have thus often dominated environmental management in developing countries (Schramm and Warford, 1989). Some colonial environmental concern was driven by individuals who saw the need for stewardship, and to a lesser extent by ‘romantic environmentalism’; but in those days there was very little pressure from NGOs, no politicisation of environmentalism and little public concern or media pressure. Indigenous peoples in particular were frequently cheated of their territory in one way or another and were seen as a nuisance, rather than source of useful wisdom (Crosby, 1987; Gadgil and Guha, 1992, 1995; Wall, 1994).