Vulnerabilities of protected lands in the face of climate and human footprint changes

Protected areas (PAs) play a pivotal role in maintaining viable populations of species and minimizing their habitat loss. Globally, there are currently over 200,000 PAs that cover approximately 15% of land area. The post-2020 global biodiversity framework aims to expand this coverage to 30% by 2030. However, focusing only on the percentage coverage of PAs without evaluating their effectiveness may fail to achieve conservation goals. Here, we use a multidimensional approach incorporating species, climate and anthropogenic vulnerabilities to assess the threat levels in over 2500 PAs in China. We identify nearly 10% of PAs as the most threatened PAs in China and about one-fifth PAs as hotspots of climate and anthropogenic vulnerabilities. We also find high climate instability in species vulnerability hotspots, suggesting an elevated likelihood of species' extirpation therein. Our framework could be useful in assessing resiliency of global protected lands and also in selecting near optimal areas for their future expansion. Proected areas (PA) expansion is a major conservation goal, but its effectiveness is debated. Here, the authors propose a multi-dimensional framework to assess PA vulnerability and select areas suitable for expansion, demonstrating it for 2572 PAs in China under a low-emission scenario.

Automated summary

Protected areas (PAs) play a crucial role in conservation efforts, but their effectiveness is debated. A multidimensional framework was proposed in this study to assess PA vulnerability and identify areas suitable for expansion. Nearly 10% of threatened PAs and around one-fifth of PAs with climate and anthropogenic vulnerabilities were identified in China, with high climate instability in species vulnerability hotspots.