Protected Areas and World Heritage Programme

1997 United Nations List of Protected Areas

Analysis of listed protected areas

The compilation of the UN List provides a unique opportunity to review and summarise the status of the world's protected areas. The UN List provides a benchmark against which the growing extent of protected areas and the use of different management categories to meet conservation objectives can be gauged at national and regional levels.

The 1997 UN List includes a total of 12,754 protected areas which are actually listed in accordance with the criteria defined in the Introduction. These cover more than 13.2 million square kilometres, equivalent to more than five million square miles. This is an area greater than the United States, Canada or China and represents an increase of some 3.9 million square kilometres since the previous edition of the UN List in 1993. However, the basis upon which the UN List has been compiled has changed: whereas in previous editions all sites in the former IUCN Categories VI, VII and VIII were excluded, the new IUCN Category VI is included in the 1997 UN List. For this reason, the apparent increase in the world's protected areas estate needs to be carefully considered.

Approximately one-third of the increase can be attributed to new protected areas established since 1994. Examples include the vast Ar-Rub'al -Khali Wildlife Management Area in Saudi Arabia, which covers 640,000 square kilometres, and the Arabian Oryx Sanctuary in Oman covering 34,000 square kilometres, both established in 1994. Significant numbers of protected areas of more than 10,000 square kilometres have also been created, for example the Little Gobi Strict Protected Area in Mongolia, which was established in 1996, and covers nearly 17,000 square kilometres. In total, some 460 new protected areas greater than 1,000 hectares have been established since the beginning of 1994.

In addition to these newly established sites, the addition of the new Category VI has also increased the recorded extent of protection, including areas established many years ago. For example, the 1993 UN List included 988 protected areas established during the five year period from 1970 to 1974. The inclusion of Category VI protected areas has increased the number of listed protected areas for the same period to 1,187 and increased the recorded area under protection in that period from 1.9 million to 2.4 million square kilometres.

Protected areas currently cover 8.81% of the world's land area. However, such an apparently simple statistic should be treated cautiously. The UN List includes a large number of protected areas that include marine habitats. Consequently, a calculation based on the extent of land area will be inflated by these marine sites. According to WCMC Protected Areas Database records, 591 entries in the UN List represent sites with at least some marine element such as open sea, kelpbeds or coral formations, covering 2.3 million square kilometres. The two largest 'marine' protected areas recorded are the Greenland National Park (972,000 square kilometres) and the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park in Australia (344,800 square kilometres). In fact the former is very largely terrestrial but has a small marine component, whilst the latter is predominantly marine in character. Until such time as digital boundary data are available for all protected areas, the use of simple habitat markers to identify marine areas will inevitably lead to some degree of error in summary statistics. If all 'marine' protected areas are excluded, the proportion of the world's land area that is protected falls to 7.28%, or 7.93% if the largely terrestrial Greenland National Park is included.

There are a further 17,596 sites recorded in the WCMC Protected Areas Database which are not listed, due to them being smaller than the 1,000ha minimum size criterion. Annex 1 summarises the total area of all sites, regardless of size, recorded in the database, giving the number, extent, and proportion of total land area protected in each IUCN Management Category for each country. For the sake of ease, Categories Ia and Ib have been merged. Annex 1 indicates that more than 30,000 protected areas have been established throughout the world, covering a total area of 13.2 million square kilometres. Thus, smaller protected areas not included in the UN List account for an additional area of only 28,584 square kilometres. These more numerous small sites raise the overall proportion of the total land area protected from 8.81% to just 8.83%.

Gross statistics such as the total extent of protection do not shed any light on the way in which governments have adopted the broad protected areas concept to meet a variety of management objectives. The classification of all sites in the UN List into IUCN Management Categories enables a distinction to be made between sites that are strictly protected through to those under sustainable use. Table 1 summarises the number and extent of protected areas in each IUCN Management Category, and their relative proportions of the total.

Table 1 indicates that Category IV (Habitat/Species Management Area) is by far the most common type of protected area, comprising 28.4% of all sites. Such sites are managed specifically to maintain the habitat of significant species or groups of species. Scientific research and education are also typical activities in such areas, but tourism and other forms of exploitation are generally not a primary management objective.

It should be noted that the total number of Category IV sites was greater in the 1993 UN List (3,808 sites, representing 39% of sites). The absolute number and the proportion have dropped quite sharply, probably due to the revised definition stipulating that Category IV sites should be under active management.

The greatest proportion of the area protected (30.25%) is accounted for by sites in IUCN Management Category II (National Park). These are relatively large, for the greater part in a natural condition, and managed for recreation and scientific research. Management Category II sites accounted for 41% of the total area protected in the 1993 UN List, but in this case the absolute area has increased, from 3.8 million square kilometres in 1993 to nearly four million square kilometres by 1997.

The most significant innovation in IUCN's revised management category system is the introduction of Category VI (Managed Resource Protected Area) in recognition of the importance protected areas play in many rural economies. Whilst being dedicated specifically to biodiversity conservation, such sites accommodate local people and a degree of sustainable use as an integral part of site management. Category VI sites account for a remarkably high proportion of the total extent recorded in the UN List (27.25%) and are more numerous than Category Ia (Strict Nature Reserve), Category 1b (Wilderness Area) or Category III (Natural Monument) sites. Two of the world's largest protected areas are classified as Category VI, namely the Ar-Rub'al -Khali Wildlife Management Area in Saudi Arabia and the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park in Australia. Together, these two sites account for 27% of the total area under this management category. In the case of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park, a number of very large permanent zones have been formally established, which are managed rather more in accordance with Category I or II than Category VI objectives. Such policies are not reflected in the way that the data are currently managed and analysed.

The continuing growth in the world's protected areas is illustrated in Figures 1 and 2. Figure 1 depicts the number (line) and total area (bars) of protected areas established in each five year period, commencing in 1900. Protected areas where either the year of establishment is not known (n=1,319), or where the site was established prior to 1900 (n=50) are not shown. The principle advantage of the non-cumulative graph in Figure 1 is that it enables the number and extent of new protected areas created in each five-year period to be clearly distinguished. In the most recent five-year period for which data are complete (1990-1994), the number of sites established has declined somewhat compared to periods in the previous decade, but the total area covered by new protected areas is almost as great (2.27 million square kilometres) as the all-time maximum of 2.33 million square kilometres established in the period 1970-1974, when Greenland National Park was created (1974). In Figure 2, the columns indicating the cumulative total area protected show little or no sign of any declining rate of establishment, perhaps contradicting the widely held view that opportunities to establish new protected areas are diminishing.

These results are indicative of the continuing efforts by governments to establish new protected areas. Indeed, the final ratification of the Environmental Protection Protocol to the Antarctic Treaty on 16 December 1997, shortly before this edition of the UN List goes to press, is further testimony to such continuing efforts. Under this Protocol the whole continent of Antarctica and its dependent marine ecosystems is designated a "natural reserve devoted to peace and science". Although not reflected in this 1997 UN List, the world's protected areas estate has more than doubled as a result of this Protocol. However, despite such encouraging progress from around the world, good system design to ensure ecological representativeness and robustness, and an adequate level of investment to provide for effective management continue to be neglected or sufficiently highly prioritised in many countries.