This guidance introduces a practical tool designed to support the identification and assessment of OECMs in China. It is structured in three parts: Section 1 provides an overview of the global OECM framework, relevant Chinese policy context, and maps potential OECMs across ecological, agricultural, and urban landscapes. Section 2 presents a set of 11 tailored indicators for assessing OECMs in China, adapted from IUCN’s international criteria.

The Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, adopted in 2022, provides a framework for the effective implementation of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) through four goals and 23 targets. Target 3 (known as the ‘30x30 target’) calls on Parties to conserve at least 30% of terrestrial, inland waters, and coastal and marine areas by 2030. These guidelines are designed to promote good practices relating to identifying, reporting, monitoring and strengthening OECMs.

This report covers both terrestrial and marine protected and conserved areas (PCAs). The audience is practitioners and policymakers who seek background information on the role of PCAs in climate change mitigation to:
- develop policies that enhance biodiversity and climate change simultaneously;
- quantify the importance of PCAs as a mechanism to reduce GHG emissions in Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) to the Paris Agreement;

As the World Heritage Convention celebrates its 50th anniversary in 2022, over 1100 sites around the world are recognized as World Heritage - places  that are so valuable to humanity that there conservation has been deemed our collective responsibility. Yet many of these exceptional places face  increasing pressure from diverse types of development projects within and around the sites.

This publication establishes a structured, rigorous standard for cross-referencing ecosystem types to the GET. It first reviews the need for reliable interoperability among ecosystem classifications and the role of the GET as a framework for synthesis. Second, it reviews the conceptual foundations of ecosystem classifications and introduces the structure of the GET.