Protected Areas and World Heritage Programme

Further Details

Partnership

This prototype database has been developed by UNEP-WCMC in collaboration with a number of partners. The IUCN World Commission on Protected Areas and UNEP-WCMC have collaborated since the early 1980s in developing a global protected areas database. More recently, UNEP-WCMC has been working with the European Environment Agency, and its Nature Conservation Topic Centre in the development of a common European Protected Areas Database. The data collected under this joint effort are reflected in the WWW version of the database.

United Nations List of National Parks and Protected Areas

Prior to the wide development of the Internet, public access to the database, maintained by UNEP-WCMC, was through either publications such as the United Nations List of National Parks and Protected Areas, or by making enquiries directly to UNEP-WCMC. This is the first attempt to provide direct public access to a selection of the information maintained in the database.

Summary Protected Areas Information

Protected areas information is collected periodically from national agencies legally charged with administration and management of protected areas. Summary information presented here comprises the legal designation, name, IUCN Management Category, size in hectares, location (latitude and longitude), and the year of establishment of some 20,000 sites.

Sites Included in the Prototype Database

In contrast to the United Nations List of National Parks and Protected Areas, this database includes records of protected areas covering less than 1,000ha. However, sites that do not qualify for an IUCN Management Category (for example production forest reserves, recommended or proposed sites) are excluded. For this reason not all legally gazetted sites will be listed.

Protected Areas Managed by Sub-national Government

In cases where protected areas are managed by sub-national government, a choice is presented. For example, if the United States is selected, the following screen will permit the user to select overseas territories such as American Samoa or Puerto Rico, or continental USA. If continental USA is selected, a further choice is offered to allow individual states to be selected. In both cases, it is possible to select the entire USA, as recognised at the United Nations.

Selecting by Legal Designation and IUCN Management Category

Two further choices are offered, namely legal designation and/or IUCN Management Category. If users wish only to review information on, for example, national parks, then that designation can be selected exclusively. Similarly, one specific IUCN Management Category can be selected. Note that it is possible to first select a designation and then an IUCN Management Category, creating a combination for which there are no records. For example, selecting national parks in the United Kingdom, and restricting the search to IUCN Management Category VI will produce zero records as all UK national parks are classified under Category V.

Text Descriptions for Certain Sites

More detailed text descriptions are available for a significant number of protected areas. These have been compiled over a number of years by UNEP-WCMC, and many have been published in regional directories. For practical reasons these descriptions are updated less frequently than the summary information, and close attention should be given to the date of compilation at the foot of each information sheet.