IUCN World Parks Congress opens

Almost 5000 delegates from over 160 countries including heads of state, park rangers, business executives and indigenous leaders, have gathered in Sydney to define the future of protected areas and place them at the centre of solutions to today’s global challenges.

Held once every decade since 1962, the IUCN World Parks Congress is the only global forum dedicated to protected areas – national parks, nature reserves and community conserved areas, established to conserve nature and the benefits it provides.

Organised by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and the Government of Australia under the theme ‘Parks, People, Planet: Inspiring solutions’, the Congress will take stock of progress made towards achieving global targets, address the threats protected areas face today and promote nature’s solutions to global sustainability challenges.

The event opened yesterday (November 12) with the arrival in Sydney of four traditional vaka canoes, which sailed from Fiji and New Zealand with Pacific leaders on board, urging the world to protect oceans against the devastating impacts of climate change.

“From the Royal National Park in Sydney – our nation’s first protected area – to the Great Barrier Reef – one the most iconic of them all – protected areas have been Australia’s heart and soul for decades,” says Australian Environment Minister Greg Hunt. “We are proud to host the event, which will set the international agenda for managing those unique and precious places for the future.”

Delegates in Sydney will devise a roadmap for achieving the global target to protect at least 17 per cent of land and 10 per cent of oceans by 2020, which itself was born of the discussions at the previous IUCN World Parks Congress in Durban, South Africa.

IUCN will present some of its most innovative products at the Congress, including the IUCN Green List of Protected Areas – the first international standard recognising well-managed protected areas – and the IUCN World Heritage Outlook – the first global assessment of natural World Heritage sites. Delegates will also see the launch of Google underwater ‘street view’, including the largest collection of underwater images of the Great Barrier Reef released to date.

The event will provide the opportunity for governments to announce new protected area commitments and emergency action plans, such as to combat the escalating poaching crisis in Africa. Its outcomes will be captured as The Promise of Sydney, which will help define innovative approaches for addressing conservation and development goals in the years ahead.

Photo Wayne Quilliam