Securing Biodiversity Beyond Protected Areas: The Role of OECMs
Context
An editorial highlights that India’s existing Protected Area (PA) network alone is insufficient to conserve biodiversity, as wildlife frequently moves beyond legally protected boundaries. It advocates recognising Other Effective Area based Conservation Measures (OECMs) and developing a National Conservation Estate that integrates protected areas, OECMs and other biodiversity rich landscapes into a connected conservation network, irrespective of land ownership.
Key Highlights
- Climate change and rapid infrastructure development are increasingly fragmenting natural habitats, making landscape-level conservation essential.
- OECMs provide formal recognition to community managed forests, wetlands, agricultural landscapes and other areas that contribute significantly to biodiversity conservation outside protected areas.
- Successful examples of wildlife friendly infrastructure, such as animal overpasses and underpasses along corridors like the Delhi – Dehradun Expressway and Pench – Seoni landscape, demonstrate that development and ecological connectivity can coexist.
- Ecological corridors play a vital role in facilitating wildlife movement, maintaining genetic diversity and reducing habitat fragmentation, making them central to modern conservation planning.
Key Concepts
Other Effective Area-based Conservation Measures (OECMs)
- OECMs are areas recognised under the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) that deliver long-term biodiversity conservation outcomes even though they are not formally designated as protected areas.
Protected Areas (PAs)
- Protected Areas include National Parks, Wildlife Sanctuaries, Conservation Reserves and Community Reserves, established under the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972 to conserve ecosystems and wildlife.
Kunming – Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (30×30 Target)
- Adopted under the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), the framework aims to conserve 30% of the world’s terrestrial and marine ecosystems by 2030, with OECMs expected to play a crucial role in achieving this target.
Ecological Corridors
- Ecological corridors are stretches of habitat that connect fragmented ecosystems, enabling the movement of species, facilitating gene flow and enhancing the long-term survival of wildlife populations.
Way Forward
- Officially identify, map and integrate OECMs into a nationwide National Conservation Estate to strengthen landscape-level conservation.
- Incorporate ecological connectivity into infrastructure planning through wildlife passages, habitat restoration and environmentally sensitive project design.
- Encourage partnerships among local communities, private landowners, corporations and civil society to promote participatory biodiversity conservation.
- Adopt an integrated landscape approach that balances ecological conservation with developmental needs while ensuring the protection of critical wildlife habitats.