IUCN World Commission on Protected Areas (WCPA)

A system plan is the design of a total reserve system covering the full range of ecosystems and communities found in a particular country, identifying the range of purposes of protected areas and the relationships among the system components (i.e. individual areas, protected areas and other land uses), and different sectors and levels of society.

This new edition reveals a global network of over 30,000 protected areas designated under national legislation which covers 13.2 million square kilometres of land, freshwater and sea, an area larger than Canada, and accounts for nearly 8 per cent of the world's land area, as well as 1.5 million square kilometres of sea.

The Ngorongoro Conservation Area is widely recognised as one of Africa's longest-standing experiments in multiple land-use promoting both natural resource conservation and pastoral development in northern Tanzania. This book provides a case study of management in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area and details the background studies and planning processes used to develop a conservation and development strategy as well as a general management plan for the area.