As a means of maximizing carbon sequestration and minimizing further losses of stored carbon, protected areas provide a powerful tool to address climate change. Their role has been recognized by the international community addressing climate change, but is generally undervalued and under explored. Protected areas have long been one of the cornerstones of biodiversity conservation. Used to promote the protection of ecosystems, natural habitats and the maintenance of viable populations of species in natural surroundings, they remain not only vital to the conservation of the world's natural and cultural resources in the face of climate change but also have an important role to play in mitigating greenhouse gas emissions by storing and sequestering carbon and potentially preventing future deforestation.
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Fact: Some intact ecosystems store or sequester huge quantities of carbon within their biomass; protected ecosystems can also act as carbon sinks, actively absorbing excess carbon dioxide from the atmosphere as part of the global carbon cycle.
Example: intact coastal wetlands, including mangroves sequester 1.5 tons of carbon per hectare per year.
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Fact: Protecting ecosystems from deforestation or allowing degraded land to regenerate can increase ecosystem resilience and capture additional carbon.
Example: land use change and in particular deforestation already accounts for approximately 12% of all greenhouse gas emissions. |
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An intact tropical forest stores between 170-250 tons of carbon per hectare (tC/ha). |
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Recipients: Suggestion Actions
- Expressions of Interest for projects that use protected areas as a critical component of a national climate change mitigation and REDD strategies
Donors: Important Information
- LifeWeb provides a user-friendly new channel for the disbursement of grant aid earmarked for climate change mitigation. Funding climate change mitigation through protected areas can also deliver important synergistic benefits to biodiversity, food and water security and local livelihoods.
- LifeWeb has already facilitated matches between donors and recipients. In the context of climate change adaptation and mitigation, the German Ministry of Environment has already contributed, through LifeWeb, close to €85m with the intention to commit similar funds annually from its climate change fund to new and existing protected areas around the world.
Relevant CBD Conference of Parties Decisions
- The Conference of Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity in decisions V/4 and VII/15 recognized the link between climate change and biodiversity.
- The Conference of Parties to the CBD in decision IX/18 (A), article 23:
Encourages Parties and invites relevant organizations to enhance research and awareness of the role that protected areas and the connectivity of networks of protected areas play in addressing climate change; - The Conference of Parties to the CBD in decision IX/18 (B), article 3 invited parties to:
(h) Explore funding opportunities for protected area design, establishment and effective management in the context of efforts to address climate change recalling that effective actions to reduce deforestation could constitute a unique opportunity for biodiversity protection, as noted by the Conference of Parties in decision VIII/30; - The Conference of Parties, in decision IX/18 (B) Article 6, Urged multilateral organizations, NGOs and other funding organizations to support developing countries (…) by:
(e) Supporting projects that demonstrate the role that protected areas play in addressing climate change
Expression of Interest: Climate Change Mitigation
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| Yayu Coffee Forest Biosphere Reserve: Model site for integration of research-based conservation and development |
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Yayu forest is one of the priority forest areas in Ethiopia. Over 450 higher plants, 50 mammal, 200 bird, and 20 amphibian species have been recorded in the area. The forest is also one of the few remnant habitats for coffee (Coffea arabica). Ethiopia is the only center of origin and diversity for C. arabica and hence is important for in situ conservation of genetic diversity. The Yayu coffee forest is also important for the livelihoods of local households and stakeholders at different levels. This project aims to reduce deforestation and forest degradation while contributing to the improvement of local livelihoods through adaptive conservation-development integration activities. To achieve this, the UNESCO Biosphere Reserve approach will be adopted. This project’s specific objectives are to strengthen the capacity of government agencies and community-based organizations responsible for biosphere reserve establishment and management, brand, promote and market coffee forest products, rehabilitate degraded parts of the forest area and establish protocols for the monitoring of forest conditions.
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| Herder Pasture Management in Protected Areas |
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The project area is situated in one of the largest remaining grassland areas on earth, the Mongolian Manchurian Steppe. The Mongolian Gazelle antelope herds represent the third-largest land animal migration in the world. The migration does not follow fixed routes, however, it can be disturbed by human activity such as domestic herding, mining and other industrial activity (more than half of the country is at least nominally designated for minerals exploitation). Effective contiguity among the three protected areas that comprise the project area will be essential for future North-South migrations. The grassland types effected in the project are underrepresented in protected areas both in Mongolia and worldwide. Their preservation and that of the animal species that reside there are recognized as priorities in the current draft national ecological gap analysis.
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| Management and Protection Enhancement of Private Natural Areas in Honduras |
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The conservation of private lands in Honduras began in 2001 and consequently the Honduran Network of Private Nature Reserves was established as a central initiative of the Mesoamerican Biological Corridor Project which was also supported by other projects and international cooperation programs, intended to bring together a significant number of landowners with interest to promote the conservation and management of natural resources in one association, with the ultimate aim of bringing these to the category of private reserves. As one of the activities under the work program of the CBD in PA, the government of the Honduran Republic promotes the strengthening of management and private conservation initiatives, considering that it can complement the conservation of fragile ecosystems underrepresented in the national system of protected areas in Honduras. Dry forest ecosystems are one of the most threatened and also a priority for private nature reserves.The remnants of dry forest are subject to constant threats from the surrounding productive landscape, due to limited capacities, knowledge and experience of local planners in land use and landscape.
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| Fiji Marine Ecological Gap Analysis |
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Following participation in a regional workshop in Nadi in February 2009 to assess progress against PoWPA for Pacific Island countries, information on important marine and estuarine species and habitats was collated during a national planning workshop in June 2009 to develop marine and estuarine conservation targets for the national-scale ecological gap analysis.
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| Strengthening Colombia’s National Protected Areas |
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This comprehensive national scale project will seek to strenghthen all of the protected areas of which Colombia's National Parks System is currently comprised. At present, this includes 56 protected areas, covering 12.602.320 ha, equivalent to 9.3% of Colombia's terrestrial area and 1.98% of its marine area.
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Dominican Republic |
30-Dec-2009 |
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| Strengthening Marine Resource Management Across the Samaná bay Protected Area Complex in the Face of Climate Change |
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Samaná Bay, a priority site for protection and one of the largest and most productive estuaries in the country, is an important humpback whale breeding area and home to large numbers of endemic species and important habitats including mangroves and seagrass beds, which in addition to providing spawning and recruitment areas, have been shown globally to sequester carbon on the same order as terrestrial forests.
Dwindling vital marine resources and biodiversity in a highly complex seascape increasingly threatened by unsustainable uses are risking the region's main economy and the livilihoods of hundreds fishers and tourism dollars generated from whale watching.
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Lao People's Democratic Republic |
19-Oct-2009 |
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| Improved management of the Nam Kading National Protected Area of Bolikhamxay Province, Lao PDR |
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The Nam Kading National Protected Area is the third largest in Lao PDR at over 1,600 square kilometers, and can likely support viable populations of many medium sized mammals under threat, including at least four Critically Endangered and Endangered primate species. These include the Northern White-cheeked Gibbon, the Southern White-cheeked Gibbon, Red-shanked Douc Langur and one or possibly two Leaf-monkey species in the taxonomically unclear (but clearly highly threatened) Trachypithecus complex.
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| Development of an independent Conservation Trust Fund supporting Uganda's protected area system |
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A coalition of Government, NGOs, and civil society organizations have come together to discuss the need to develop a mechanism for long-term financing of Uganda’s protected areas. The group has recommended the creation of the Uganda Conservation Trust Fund (UCTF) that is independent of Government and which can generate the financial resources necessary to support the management of protected areas in Uganda.
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| Strengthening the management of 7 Protected Areas in the Department of Olancho |
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The project will take place in the Department of Olancho, one of the most important regions related to forestry resources, which are very important for the national and local economy. The majority of the local communities involved in this project live in poverty, and lack the tools and mechanisms to effectively participate in the management of protected areas. The project objectives include consolidating the network of protected areas (7) of the Region of Olancho, managing PAs effectively and participatively and achieving an ecologically representative network, in order to accomplish environmental, social and economic functions.
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| Action Tsitongambarika |
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Intrinsic Biodiversity Problem - The disappearance of the lowland humid forest ecosystem of TGK would constitute a loss of the largest remaining area of this highly threatened and diverse vegetation type in Southern Madagascar, as well as a number of species endemic to the SE, and even to TGK itself, and many more that are poorly, if at all, represented in existing PAs.
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| Management support to the Northern Reefs management area |
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The Northern Reefs area includes a large number of marine habitat types, including seagrass beds, algal flats, barrier reefs, fringing reefs, patch reefs, atolls, sunken atoll, lagoon areas, small sand spits/islands, and small volcanic rock islands.
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For more information:
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Interactive Carbon Calculator
This innovative tool provides users with initial estimates of carbon values for existing protected areas or any polygon drawn on a global map.
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Guidance Material
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The Natural Fix? The role of ecosystems in climate mitigation. A UNEP rapid response assessment.
Trumper, K., Bertzky, M., Dickson, B., van der Heijden, G., Jenkins, M., Manning; United Nations Environment Programme, UNEPWCMC
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Natural Solutions: Protected areas helping people cope with climate change
Dudley, N., S. Stolton, A. Belokurov, L. Krueger, N. Lopoukhine, K. MacKinnon, T. Sandwith and N. Sekhran; IUCN WCPA, TNC, UNDP, WCS, The World Bank and WWF
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 Biodiversity and Livelihoods: REDD benefits (2009)
 Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity (2009); Connecting Biodiversity and Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation: Report of the Second Ad Hoc Technical Expert Group on Biodiversity and Climate Change. Montreal, Technical Series No. 41.
 The World Bank (2009); Convenient Solutions to an Inconvenient Truth: Ecosystem-based Approaches to Climate Change. Washington, DC, USA.
 Ben Brown (2007); Resilience Thinking Applied to The Mangroves of Indonesia. A Look at the General Resilience of Indonesia’s Mangrove Forests, as Socio-Ecological Systems with Reference to Potential Thresholds.
 BirdLife International; Partners with nature: How healthy ecosystems are helping the world’s most vulnerable adapt to climate change
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