Governments achieve target of protecting 17% of land globally

By Dilip -

An area greater than the land mass of Russia has been added to the world’s network of national parks and conservation areas since 2010, amid growing pressure to protect nature. As of today, about 17% of land and inland water ecosystems and 8% of marine areas are within formal protected areas, with the total coverage increasing by 42% since the beginning of the last decade, according to the Protected Planet report by the UN Environment Programme (Unep) and International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

The Protected Planet report is the final report card on Aichi Target 11 – the global 10-year target on protected and conserved areas. The UN calculated that 16.64% of land and inland waters has been protected to date but concluded that governments had met the 17% target because of a lag in reporting on data. The 17% ambition was just one of seven parts of Aichi Target 11. Governments have not fully met any of the 20 Aichi biodiversity targets agreed in Nagoya, Japan, in 2010.

Despite making significant progress, the report warns, a third of key biodiversity areas lack any coverage, connectivity between areas protected for nature remains poor and gaps remain in the quality of conservation work…

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/may/19/governments-achieve-10-year-target-of-protecting-17-percent-land-aoe

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