U.N. Says Number of Protected Areas Tops 100,000

Reuters
The United Nations said on Tuesday that the number of protected areas on the planet had surpassed 100,000 and that a big chunk of the Amazonian rainforest and Arctic tundra were now safeguarded.

The reasons for protecting sites included their value in researching particular ecosystems, their unique wildlife, their status as national monuments and their natural beauty.

The number and size of the protected areas on the list has grown more than tenfold since it was first produced in 1962, with 102,102 sites covering an area of 18.8 million square kilometers (7.26 million square miles) now cataloged.

Europe was the region with the most protected areas, with 43,000, but Central and South America had the highest percentage of land under protection, at more than 25 percent each.

REUTERS

It is certainly a good idea to protect certain areas for many different good reasons. We as people need to help protect the entire planet for the future of mankind, I have noticed that pollution has become a huge problem in some big and even some small cities near where I live. It mentioned that less than 10 percent of the world's large lakes are protected and less than 0.5 percent of the world's seas and oceans are within protected areas, but we need to be more aware of keeping our water clean as well, I feel it's everyone's job who is fortunate enough to call planet Earth home to keep our world clean and "protected."