Biodiversity issues for consideration in the planning, establishment and management of protected area sites and networks

This report highlights the critical issues relating to the selection, planning and effective management of protected areas. The report contains twenty five articles useful for policymakers, managers, and other actors in the protected area community. The establishment and management of protected areas together with conservation, sustainable use and restoration initiatives in the adjacent land and seascape are central to article 8 on in-situ conservation of the Convention on Biological Diversity.Some of the reports key messages include:protected areas need to make a solid contribution to poverty alleviation and sustainable development. The main here is how to find the right balance between the desire to live harmoniously with nature and the need to exploit resources to sustain life and develop economicallythe value of protected areas is poorly understood and greatly under-valued by markets, politicians and the general publicexisting protected areas do not adequately cover all important ecosystems, habitats and speciesthe global gap analysis is considered to be an effective conservation planning tool to assess the effectiveness of the global protected area network in representing species, and to provide recommendations for the future expansion of this networkthe diverse inland water ecosystems are the most threatened of all ecosystem types because of habitat degradation and unsustainable exploitationthere is a need for developing practical methodologies to address the adequacy and efficiency of protected forest areaswhile planning, establishing and managing protected areas, there is a need to have in mind corridors, connectivity and ecological networksthe relatively new concept of governance in the conservation field can help design planning and management systems compatible with resident or user communities, whose presence can be regarded as a conservation asset rather than a liability.[adapted from author]