Explanatory Guide on Target 11 of the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity - A guide to Target 11 of the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011-2020

Abstract

This guide focuses on Target 11 on protected areas of the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity. It is part of a series of guides which is meant to help Parties and other stakeholders take action in support of the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity during the United Nations Decade on Biodiversity. Establishment of comprehensive, ecologically representative, effectively managed and financially secured protected area networks is a critical strategy not only for biodiversity conservation, but for securing ecosystem goods and services, enabling climate change adaptation and mitigation, and helping countries achieve the Millennium Development Goals. Recognizing these critical roles of protected areas, the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in February 2004 committed to a comprehensive and specific set of actions known as the Programme of Work on Protected Areas (PoWPA). By emphasizing the equitable sharing of costs and benefits, recognizing various governance types and by giving prominence to ecological representation, management effectiveness and multiple benefits, the PoWPA is the most comprehensive global plan of action for effective implementation of protected areas and is considered as a defining framework or “blueprint” for protected areas for the next decades. CBD Parties hailed PoWPA as the most implemented of CBD programmes and a successful initiative. Successive decisions of the CBD Conference of Parties (COP) from its seventh to tenth meetings established the policy environment fostering the implementation of the PoWPA.