Key Biodiversity Areas (KBAs)

KBAs are sites of importance for the global persistence of biodiversity, but this does not necessarily imply that a specific conservation action, such as protected area designation, is required. Conversely, areas not identified as KBAs are not necessarily of lesser importance. The KBA criteria have quantitative thresholds to ensure that site identification is transparent, objective and repeatable, but the availability of high-quality data differs significantly between different taxonomic groups and regions, and there is unavoidable uncertainty and potential for some degree of error in the estimates used to define a KBA. The KBA criteria do not just consider populations of species but also their habitats or ecosystems. Ecosystems are identified by the unique collections of species they sustain, so their conservation helps to ensure the simultaneous survival of many species. However, ecosystems are being rapidly lost and degraded around the world due to human impacts. KBAs can be identified for ecosystems that are globally threatened as defined by the IUCN Red List of Threatened Ecosystems or for ecosystems that are geographically restricted and therefore at risk of being lost due to unsustainable human activity. There is also a KBA criterion for sites that are fully intact in terms of their fauna and flora, where there is globally outstanding ecological integrity. These sites are becoming increasingly rare around the world as human impacts spread, with only about 26% of the world showing low human impact. Intact sites boast largely unmodified collections of plants as well as retaining their characteristic animal species – unlike many areas of formerly intact forest that appear healthy but their animal population have been depleted by excessive hunting pressures. These intact sites provide disproportionally large climate benefits to people and are the last few areas of true wilderness left on earth.