High and Far: Biases in the Location of Protected Areas

Lucas Joppa; Alexander Pfaff

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0008273

December 11, 2009PLoS ONEOpen Access

High and Far: Biases in the Location of Protected Areas

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Key Points

To evaluate global siting patterns of protected areas and determine whether location biases limit their effectiveness in preventing land conversion.
Conducted a globally comprehensive spatial assessment of protected area distributions relative to land conversion pressures.
Extended prior nation-level analyses to evaluate global siting impacts under international conservation targets, including the Convention on Biological Diversity 2010 Target.
Assessed policy implications for international avoided-deforestation frameworks, specifically carbon-based payments under REDD.
Protected areas exhibit a global bias toward sites where they least prevent land conversion, blunting their practical impact even under theoretical complete protection.
Applying siting mandates such as the 10% ecoregion conservation target at national levels could substantially enhance the real-world impact of protected areas.
Targeting protection toward high-threat landscapes offers greater conservation gains and improves outcomes for avoided deforestation and REDD carbon payments.

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Implication

Global spatial analysis reveals systematic location biases of protected areas toward low-threat lands, suggesting that targeting conversion pressure can optimize avoided deforestation outcomes.

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Joppa et al. (2009) studied this question.

synapsesocial.com/papers/69d917429402b8412aa3c0f3 https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0008273

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High and Far: Biases in the Location of Protected Areas

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High and Far: Biases in the Location of Protected Areas

Key Points

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