Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-s2hrs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-15T11:15:49.633Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The nature and extent of terrestrial protected area coverage on the UK's Overseas Territories

Part of: Humans and Island Environments

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 March 2017

NICHOLAS I. WILKINSON ,
JONATHAN G. HALL ,
JULIET A. VICKERY  and
GRAEME M. BUCHANAN
NICHOLAS I. WILKINSON*
Affiliation:
RSPB Centre for Conservation Science, RSPB, 2 Lochside View, Edinburgh Park, Edinburgh, EH12 9DH, UK
JONATHAN G. HALL
Affiliation:
International Directorate, RSPB, The Lodge, Sandy, Bedfordshire, SG19 2DL, UK
JULIET A. VICKERY
Affiliation:
RSPB Centre for Conservation Science, RSPB, The Lodge, Sandy, Bedfordshire, SG19 2DL, UK Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, David Attenborough Building (CCI), Pembroke St, Cambridge, CB2 3QY, UK
GRAEME M. BUCHANAN
Affiliation:
RSPB Centre for Conservation Science, RSPB, 2 Lochside View, Edinburgh Park, Edinburgh, EH12 9DH, UK
*
*Correspondence: Nicholas I. Wilkinson e-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Summary

Signatories to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) agreed to the effective protection of at least 17% of the terrestrial environment by 2020 (Aichi Target 11). Here, we assess the coverage of terrestrial protected areas (land protected by legislation) on the UK's Overseas Territories. These 14 Territories are under the sovereignty of the UK, a signatory of the CBD, and are particularly biodiverse. Eight Territories have protected areas covering 17% or more of their land, but the extent of protection across these Territories as a whole is low, with only 4.8% of this land designated as protected. This protection covered 51% of sites already identified as of conservation importance (Important Bird and Biodiversity Areas), although only 8% of the area of these sites was protected. The expansion of effective protection to meet the 17% target provides an opportunity to capture the most important sites for conservation. Locally led designation will require an improvement in knowledge of the distribution and density of species. This, together with measures to ensure that the protection is enforced and effective, will require provision of resources. This should be seen as an investment in the UK meeting its obligations to Aichi Target 11.

Keywords

site conservationIBAsUKOTsAichi targetsCBDecoregions
Type
Papers
Information
Environmental Conservation , Volume 44 , Issue 4: Thematic section: Humans and Island Environments , December 2017 , pp. 397 - 404
Copyright
Copyright © Foundation for Environmental Conservation 2017 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

Supplementary material can be found online at https://doi.org/10.1017/S0376892917000145

References

AZE (2016) Alliance for Zero Extinction [www document]. URL http://www.zeroextinction.org/ Google Scholar
Beresford, A.E., Eshiamwata, G.W., Donald, P.F., Balmford, A., Bertzky, B., Brink, A.B., Fishpool, L.D.C., Mayaux, P., Simonetti, D. & Buchanan, G.M. (2013) Protection reduces loss of natural land-cover at sites of conservation importance across Africa. PLoS ONE 8: e65370.Google Scholar
Beresford, A.E., Buchanan, G.M., Sanderson, F.J., Jefferson, R. & Donald, P.F. (2016) The Contributions of the EU Nature Directives to the CBD and other multilateral environmental agreements. Conservation Letters 9: 479–488.Google Scholar
International, BirdLife (2015) Important Bird and Biodiversity Areas: A Global Network for Conserving Biodiversity and Benefiting People. Cambridge, UK: BirdLife International.Google Scholar
Boyd, C., Brooks, T.M., Butchart, S.H.M., Edgar, G.J., da Fonseca, G.A.B., Hawkins, F., Hoffmann, M., Sechrest, W., Stuart, S.N. & van Dijk, P.P. (2008) Scale and the conservation of threatened species. Conservation Letters 1: 37–43.Google Scholar
Butchart, S.H.M., Clarke, M., Smith, R.J., Sykes, R.E., Scharlemann, J.P.W., Harfoot, M., Buchanan, G.M., Angulo, A., Balmford, A., Bertzky, B., Brooks, T.M., Carpenter, K.E., Comeros-Raynal, M.T., Cornell, J., Ficetola, G.F., Fishpool, L.D.C., Fuller, R.A., Geldmann, J., Harwell, H., Hilton-Taylor, C., Hoffmann, M., Joolia, A., Joppa, L., Kingston, N., May, I., Milam, A., Polidoro, B., Ralph, G., Richman, N., Rondinini, C., Segan, D.B., Skolnik, B., Spalding, M.D., Stuart, S.N., Symes, A., Taylor, J., Visconti, P., Watson, J.E.M., Wood, L. & Burgess, N.D. (2015) Shortfalls and solutions for meeting national and global conservation area targets. Conservation Letters 8: 329–337.Google Scholar
CBD (2011) Conference of the Parties Decision X/2: Strategic plan for biodiversity 2011–2020 [www document]. URL www.cbd.int/decision/cop/?id=12268 Google Scholar
Chape, S., Harrison, J., Spalding, M. & Lysenko, I. (2005) Measuring the extent and effectiveness of protected areas as an indicator for meeting global biodiversity targets. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B – Biological Sciences 360: 443–455.Google Scholar
Churchyard, T.K., Eaton, M.A., Havery, S., Hall, J., Millet, J., Farr, A., Cuthbert, R., Stringer, C. & Vickery, J.A. (2016) The biodiversity of the United Kingdom's Overseas Territories: a stock take of species occurrence and assessment of key knowledge gaps. Biodiversity and Conservation 25: 1677–1694.Google Scholar
Dawson, J., Oppel, S., Cuthbert, R., Holmes, N., Bird, J.P., Butchart, S.H.M., Spatz, D.R. & Tershy, B. (2015) Prioritizing islands for the eradication of invasive vertebrates in the United Kingdom Overseas Territories. Conservation Biology 29: 143–153.Google Scholar
DEFRA (2009) United Kingdom Overseas Territories Biodiversity Strategy [www document]. URL https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/69204/pb13335-uk-ot-strat-091201.pdf Google Scholar
Dudley, N. (ed.) (2008) Guidelines for Applying Protected Area Management Categories. Gland, Switzerland: IUCN.Google Scholar
ESRI (2010) ArcGIS 10.1 for Desktop. Redlands, CA: Environmental Systems Research Institute.Google Scholar
Fishpool, L.D.C. & Evans, M.I. (2001) Important Bird Areas in Africa and Associated Islands: Priority Sites for Conservation. Cambridge, UK: Pisces Publications.Google Scholar
GADM (2015) GADM version 2.8 database of Global Administrative Areas [www document]. URL http://gadm.org/ Google Scholar
Heaney, L.R. (2000) Dynamic disequilibrium: a long-term, large scale perspective on the equilibrium model of island biogeography. Global Ecology and Biogeography 9: 59–74.Google Scholar
IUCN (2016) Summary Statistics [www document]. URL http://www.iucnredlist.org/about/summary-statistics Google Scholar
IUCN & UNEP-WCMC (2015) The World Database on Protected Areas (WDPA), Cambridge, UK: UNEP-WCMC [www document]. URL www.protectedplanet.net Google Scholar
Jenkins, C.N. & Joppa, L. (2009) Expansion of the global terrestrial protected area system. Biological Conservation 142: 2166–2174.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jenkins, C.N. & Joppa, L. (2010) Considering protected area category in conservation analyses. Biological Conservation 143: 7–8.Google Scholar
Keith, D.A., Rodríguez, J.P., Brooks, T.M., Burgman, M.A., Barrow, E.G., Bland, L., Comer, P. J., Franklin, J., Link, J., McCarthy, M.A., Miller, R.M., Murray, N.J., Nel, J., Nicholson, E., Oliveira-Miranda, M.A., Regan, T.J., Rodríguez-Clark, K.M., Rouget, M. & Spalding, M.D. (2015) The IUCN Red List of Ecosystems: motivations, challenges, and applications. Conservation Letters 8: 214–226.Google Scholar
Kingsford, R.T., Watson, J.E.M., Lundquist, C.J., Venter, O., Hughes, L., Johnston, E.L., Atherton, J., Gawel, M., Keith, D.A., Mackey, B.G., Morley, C., Possingham, H.P., Raynor, B., Recher, H.F. & Wilson, K.A. (2009) Major conservation policy issues for biodiversity in Oceania. Conservation Biology 23: 834–840.Google Scholar
Mallari, N.A.D., Collar, N.J., McGowan, P.J.K. & Marsden, S.J. (2016) Philippine protected areas are not meeting the biodiversity coverage and management effectiveness requirements of Aichi Target 11. Ambio 45: 313–322.Google Scholar
Olson, D.M., Dinerstein, E., Wikramanayake, E.D., Burgess, N.D., Powell, G.V.N., Underwood, E.C., D'Amico, J.A., Itoua, I., Strand, H.E., Morrison, J.C., Loucks, C.J., Allnutt, T.F., Ricketts, T.H., Kura, Y., Lamoreux, J.F., Wettengel, W.W., Hedao, P. & Kassem, K.R. (2001) Terrestrial ecoregions of the world: a new map of life on Earth. Bioscience 51: 933–938.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pain, D.J., Fishpool, L., Byaruhanga, A., Arinaitwe, J. & Balmford, A. (2005) Biodiversity representation in Uganda's forest IBAs. Biological Conservation 125: 133–138.Google Scholar
Tear, T.H., Stratton, B.N., Game, E.T., Brown, M.A., Apse, C.D. & Shirer, R.R. (2014) A return-on-investment framework to identify conservation priorities in Africa. Biological Conservation 173: 42–52.Google Scholar
Teelucksingh, S., Nunes, P.A.L.D. & Perrings, C. (2013) Biodiversity-based development in small island developing states. Environment and Development Economics 18: 381–391.Google Scholar
Tittensor, D.P., Walpole, M., Hill, S.L., Boyce, D.G., Britten, G.L., Burgess, N.D., Butchart, S.H., Leadley, P.W., Regan, E.C., Alkemade, R. & Baumung, R. (2014) A mid-term analysis of progress toward international biodiversity targets. Science 346: 241–244.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Whittaker, R.J. (1998) Island Biogeography: Ecology, Evolution, and Conservation. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Supplementary material: File

Wilkinson supplementary material

Wilkinson supplementary material

Download Wilkinson supplementary material(File)
File 18.4 KB