Editing Protected area (section)

==Protection of natural resources==
The objective of protected areas is to conserve [[biodiversity]] and to provide a way for measuring the progress of such conservation. Protected areas will usually encompass several other zones that have been deemed important for particular conservation uses, such as [[Important Bird Areas]] (IBA) and [[Endemic Bird Areas]] (EBA), [[Centres of Plant Diversity]] (CPD), [[Indigenous and Community Conserved Area]]s (ICCA), [[Alliance for Zero Extinction]] Sites (AZE) and [[Key Biodiversity Areas]] (KBA) among others. Likewise, a protected area or an entire network of protected areas may lie within a larger geographic zone that is recognised as a terrestrial or marine [[ecoregions]] (see [[Global 200]]), or a [[Crisis Ecoregions]] for example.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.biodiversitya-z.org/|title=Biodiversity A-Z|website=www.biodiversitya-z.org}}</ref> As a result, Protected Areas can encompass a broad range of governance types. A wide variety of rights-holders and stakeholders are involved in the governance and management of protected areas, including forest protected areas, such as government agencies and ministries at various levels, elected and traditional authorities, indigenous peoples and local communities, private individuals and non-profit trusts, among others.<ref name="PA">{{Cite book|last=Borrini-Feyerabend, G., N. Dudley, T. Jaeger, B. Lassen, N. Pathak Broome, A. Phillips and T. Sandwith|url=https://www.iucn.org/sites/dev/files/content/documents/governance_of_protected_areas_from_understanding_to_action.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201217083528/https://www.iucn.org/sites/dev/files/content/documents/governance_of_protected_areas_from_understanding_to_action.pdf |archive-date=2020-12-17 |url-status=live|title=Governance of Protected Areas. From understanding to action|publisher=IUCN|year=2013|isbn=978-2-8317-1608-4}}</ref> Most protected-area and forest management institutions acknowledge the importance of recognizing the rights of indigenous peoples and local communities, sharing the costs and benefits of protected areas and actively involving them in their governance and management.<ref name="PA" /> This has led to the recognition of four main types of governance, defined on the basis of who holds authority, responsibility, and who can be held accountable for the key decisions for protected areas.<ref name="PA" /> Indeed, governance of protected areas has emerged a critical factor in their success.

Subsequently, the range of natural resources that any one protected area may guard is vast. Many will be allocated primarily for species conservation whether it be flora or fauna or the relationship between them, but protected areas are similarly important for conserving sites of (indigenous) cultural importance and considerable reserves of natural resources such as;

* '''Carbon stocks:''' Carbon emissions from deforestation account for an estimated 20% of global carbon emissions, so in protecting the worlds carbon stocks [[greenhouse gas emissions]] are reduced and longterm land cover change is prevented, which is an effective strategy in the struggle against global warming. Of all global terrestrial carbon stock, 15.2% is contained within protected areas. Protected areas in South America hold 27% of the world's carbon stock, which is the highest percentage of any continent in both absolute terms and as a proportion of the total stock.<ref>Campbell, A., Miles. L., Lysenko, I., Hughes, A., Gibbs, H. ''Carbon Storage in Protected Areas: Technical Report'' (UNEP-World Conservation Monitoring Centre, 2008)</ref>
* '''Rainforests:''' 18.8% of the world's forest is covered by protected areas and sixteen of the twenty forest types have 10% or more protected area coverage. Of the 670 ecoregions with [[forest cover]], 54% have 10% or more of their forest cover protected under IUCN Categories I – VI.<ref>Coad L., Burgess, N.D., Bomhard, B., and Besancon, C. ''Progress on the Convention on Biological Diversity's 2010 and 2012 Targets for Protected Area Coverage'' "Looking to the Future of the CBD Programme of Work on Protected Areas" (Cambridge: UNEP-WCMC, 2009)</ref>
* '''Mountains:''' Nationally designated protected areas cover 14.3% of the world's mountain areas, and these mountainous protected areas made up 32.5% of the world's total terrestrial protected area coverage in 2009. Mountain protected area coverage has increased globally by 21% since 1990 and out of the 198 countries with mountain areas, 43.9% still have less than 10% of their mountain areas protected.<ref>Rodríguez-Rodríguez, D., Bomhard, B., Fitzgerald, C. & Blyth, S. ''How much of the world's mountain area is protected?'' (Cambridge, UNEP-WCMC, 2009)</ref>

Annual updates on each of these analyses are made in order to make comparisons to the [[Millennium Development Goals]] and several other fields of analysis are expected to be introduced in the monitoring of protected areas management effectiveness, such as freshwater and marine or coastal studies which are currently underway, and islands and drylands which are currently in planning.<ref>Bomhard, B., Butchart, S., Tracking Progress Towards the CBD's Targets for Protected Area Coverage and Management Effectiveness (UNEP-WCMC & BirdLife International, 2010)</ref>