This report presents the findings of an expedition conducted under the Fiji MESCAL programme at the demonstration site: the Rewa River mangroves. The expedition team carried out surveys of the area’s biodiversity, cultural and archaeological heritage and its socioeconomic profile.
Flora, vegetation and ecology
The world’s more than 200 000 protected areas come in many forms, on land and at sea, and occur in every country (Bertzky et al. 2012). They are places that people establish to conserve natural and cultural heritage and to sustain their benefits for society. Among other values, protected areas allow people to connect with nature for their inspiration, education, wellbeing and recreation.
We are entering an era of unparalleled opportunity to address the global crisis facing nature.
The COVID-19 pandemic has shone a spotlight on the threat posed by biodiversity loss not just to ecosystem health, but also to the health of humans. This has generated new momentum to realise the benefits of protected and conserved areas to their full potential.
Conserving our sea of islands: State of protected and conserved areas in Oceania report is the first comprehensive regional assessment of protected and conserved areas. The Biodiversity and Protected Areas Management Programme (BIOPAMA) supported the preparation of this report with the following aims:
Document the status of protected and conserved areas in Oceania;
Review and outline progress made towards achieving national and international targets for protected and conserved areas, including for coverage, representativeness, connectivity and effectiveness;
Understanding the state and value of the world’s wetlands The Global Wetland Outlook 2025 presents a synthesis of scientific information on the value of the world’s wetlands, the costs to society due to wetland loss and degradation and the scale of investment needed to restore wetlands. It is based on the latest publications and data on the extent of inland, coastal and marine wetlands and global databases on the benefits that wetlands provide.
The Blue Carbon Finance Toolbox provides a comprehensive overview of financial mechanisms and strategies to support the conservation, restoration, and sustainable management of blue carbon ecosystems.
There is a widespread perception that illegal fishing is common in marine protected areas (MPAs) due to strong incentives for poaching and the high cost of monitoring and enforcement. Using artificial intelligence and satellite-based Earth observations, we provide estimates of industrial fishing activity in fully and highly protected MPAs worldwide, in which such fishing is banned. We find little to no activity in most cases.
Papua New Guinea (PNG) is home to one of the largest mangrove habitats (6% of the world’s mangrove area), which plays a crucial role in coastal protection, carbon sequestration and supporting biodiversity and livelihoods. With such an extensive mangrove cover, monitoring at scale is invaluable for sustainable mangrove management (conservation, protection and restoration).
Mangroves provide numerous ecosystem services and are increasingly recognized as a natural climate solution. As a result, multiple recent initiatives have set ambitious mangrove restoration targets. However, there has been little research estimating the costs of achieving such targets, either site by site or in aggregate. Here, we spatially model the costs of restoring mangroves globally based on reported implementation costs from 249 restoration projects in 25 countries.
This guidance aims to inform the planning, design, and implementation of new and expanded MPAs, OECMs, areas conserved by Indigenous peoples, and networks of protected and conserved areas at the community, national, and international levels. It focuses on why it is important to consider climate change in MPA1 planning, and how new areas can be established in ways that build climate resilience, adaptation, and mitigation.
