Protected areas cover a sixth of Earth's land and freshwater

A new United Nations report finds roughly a sixth of the planet’s land and freshwater area now lies within protected or conservation areas

WASHINGTON -- Roughly a sixth of the planet’s land and freshwater area now lies within protected or conservation areas, according to a United Nations report released Wednesday. Next comes the hard part. The world needs to ensure that those regions are actually effectively managed to stabilize the climate and to curb biodiversity loss while also increasing the total area of protected places, scientists say. “Protected and conserved areas play a crucial role in tackling biodiversity loss,” said Neville Ash, director of the U.N. Environment Programme World Conservation Monitoring Centre, which produced the report. But simply drawing lines on a map isn’t enough. Conservation areas “need to be effectively managed and equitably governed,” he said. The “ Protected Planet ” report also found that about 8% of coastal and ocean waters are within protected areas.