Professional Documents
Culture Documents
protected areas
Several problems with the world's current protected areas mean that
the full diversity of the Earths habitats and species is not properly
protected.
These problems include:
Lack of funds
putting representative protected area networks in place and managing them
effectively requires money. However, few countries, including the richest, have
managed to define and establish ways to provide long-term, sustainable financing for
individual protected areas, let alone a network. This funding gap is particularly acute
in developing countries and for marine protected areas. There is a clear need to find
new and sustainable financial resources to supplement funding for existing protected
areas and to support the establishment of new protected areas.
Poor management
the declaration of a protected area is not an end result: a whole series of conditions
must be in place for protected areas to be effective. Effective management is
Human activities
closely linked with poor management are threats from widespread and either poorly
managed or illegal human activities occurring within protected areas in many parts of
the world. These include logging, poaching of protected animals, mining, and
encroachment by human settlements and agriculture. Human activities outside of
protected areas are also often a threat such as those leading to pollution, climate,
and the introduction of invasive species.
Future benefits?
By helping to ensure the continued existence of the wondrous array of life forms on
our planet, protected areas may bring future benefits that, while impossible to
foresee at the moment, could have profound implications for people around the
world.
Genetic diversity, for example, is already recognized as a valuable source of as yet
undiscovered medical compounds that may be useful to fight diseases such as
HIV/AIDS.
And biomimicry where scientists look to natures designs and processes to solve
human problems is emerging as a new source of innovative ideas and solutions.
Arguments for
protection: biodiversity
The intrinsic value of species and ecosystems in their own right makes
biodiversity worthy of protection.
Life is what sets our planet apart but the wondrous variety of species that
share our home is rapidly disappearing.
Thanks to destructive human activities, the current rate of species extinction is
at least 100-1,000 times higher than the expected natural rate. This rate of
biodiversity loss is comparable with the great mass extinction events that have
previously occurred only five or six times in the Earths history.
Protected areas are essential tools to halt this biodiversity loss.
They act as refuges for species, genetic diversity, and ecological processes
that cannot survive in intensely managed landscapes and seascapes. They
also provide space for natural evolution and future ecological restoration.
Protected areas can also help buy time for habitats and species threatened
by global warming and climate change, while the world works out the only
long-term solution: reducing CO2 emissions.
Arguments for
protection:
environmental goods &
services
development.
Despite this, development strategies, policies, and programmes often neglect
the importance of environmental protection for meeting long-term sustainable
development goals.
Arguments for
protection: livelihoods
Protection of species and natural areas can help maintain existing livelihoods,
as well as create new livelihood opportunities.
Hundreds of millions of people around the world rely on natural resources for their
livelihoods. For example, an estimated 250 million people in developing countries
directly depend on small-scale fisheries for food and income.
Environmental goods and services provided by natural habitats like clean
water, food, fibers, building materials, medicines, and energy - are also extremely
important for meeting the subsistence needs of the worlds poorest people. In India
alone, an estimated 50 million people are directly dependent on forests for their
subsistence.
Well-managed protected areas have a clear role to play in protecting the
species and ecosystems that support these livelihoods.
Protected areas can also sometimes bring alternative livelihood opportunities, for
example through sustainable tourism or conservation work.
This can be especially important to poor rural and coastal communities with minimal
options for formal employment. It can also be extremely cost effective. For example,
maintenance of Costa Ricas national parks costs about US$12 million each year; in
1991 these parks generated foreign exchange of more than US$330 million from
some 500,000 overseas visitors.
Arguments for
protection: culture
Natural habitats and biodiversity form a strong part of peoples culture and
values be that purely as sites for recreation or through a deeper cultural
identity.
Just about every faith system in the world, for example, has a link with nature and
the conservation of land and water.
Indeed, sacred areas are probably the oldest form of habitat protection on the planet,
and still form a large and largely unrecognized network of sanctuaries around the
world.
Biodiversity and natural landscapes are also increasingly recognized as an
important part of a nations unique character or value, comparable with valuable
cultural sites.
Protected areas have an important role to play in preserving these less
tangible, but nevertheless important, values.
This is especially the case for the many sacred natural areas and faith-based land
management systems currently under threat, due to cultural breakdown, pressures
on land and resources, and poor governance. Closely related to this, protection of
spiritual sites can sometimes be an effective way of also protecting a people, culture,
or ethnic group.
Conversely, sacred areas and other spiritual sites can contribute directly to global
conservation efforts because they are often themselves well-conserved, through
traditions that sometimes stretch back for thousands of years.
For example, patches of original lowland forest survive as islands in a sea of
agriculture and other land uses on Kenyas coast, due to their protection as sacred
Kaya forests by the Mijikenda ethnic groups. These sacred forests have high
A project funded by the European Union is developing a methodology that will help
stakeholders (in particular protected area managers, politicians and rural
communities) to identify and implement the measures necessary to build protected
areas resilience so that they can better adapt to climate change. The methodology
will be tested through its practical application in six protected areas in Colombia,
Madagascar and the Philippines: Gorgona and Sanquianga National Parks
(Colombia), Nosy Hara and Ambodivahibe (Madagsascar), and SinapaanCamudmud Marine Protected Area (MPA) and Liguid MPA in the Island Garden City
of Samal (IGACOS) (the Philippines).