[5][6] In 1998, he published a paper in Nature describing how the biodiversity of rainforest in Uganda could be estimated by counting populations of birds and butterflies.
The Financial Times commented that removing agricultural subsidies was already known to be "fraught with difficulties" and that only $1bn had been channelled into conservation projects since an agreement in 1992.
Balmford suggested that conservationists could create a game similar to Pokémon to encourage children to learn about the environment, saying "People tend to care about what they know.
Balmford stated that it is important that the value for money of a conservation project should be taken into account as well as the number of threatened species in the region.
[17][18] In 2009, a paper that Balmford co-authored was published in Science that found that the benefits gained from deforestation in the Amazon Rainforest were quickly reversed.
Balmford described the current situation as "disastrous for local people, wildlife and the global climate" but hoped that REDD may allow changes to occur in the future.
[26][27] In 2003, he was included on a list of the top 50 visionaries building a better world by Scientific American for his work on economic development and its impact on the environment.