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October 21, 2024 (Cali, Colombia) — As global leaders gather this week for CBD COP16 in Cali, Colombia, ������ϲʿ�������ֳ�ֱ�� WCPA has co-published a significant new report with its partners Earth Insight, Campaign for Nature, Wild Heritage, International Indigenous Forum on Biodiversity, and One Earth.

, titled "Closing Window of Opportunity: Mapping Threats from Oil, Gas and Mining to Important Areas for Conservation in the Pantropics" presents a stark picture of the escalating risks to both ecological integrity and the livelihoods of Indigenous communities, whose stewardship of lands and waters across the pantropics spans millennia. Newly released maps vividly illustrate the extent of extractive concession overlap with important areas for conservation across the Amazon Basin, Congo Basin, and Southeast Asia. As industrial activity surges throughout the pantropical belt, the window of opportunity to protect these invaluable ecosystems is rapidly closing.

Key findings from the report include:

• Over 500 Key Biodiversity Areas (KBAs) and 180 million hectares of high-integrity forests are overlapped by fossil fuel and mining concessions in the Amazon basin, Congo basin, and Southeast Asia
• Oil, gas, and mining concessions are directly threatening the livelihoods of Indigenous peoples and local communities across the pantropics - over 30 million hectares of Indigenous Territories in the Amazon are overlapping with oil and gas concessions and 9 million hectares with mining concessions. 
• Across the pantropical belt, at least 25.4 million hectares of protected areas are overlapped by oil and gas blocks.
• Several case studies in the report also show extractive expansion threats to Indigenous Peoples living in voluntary isolation. 

Safeguarding these critical conservation areas is essential for achieving Target 3 of the Global Biodiversity Framework, which commits parties to protecting 30% of the planet’s land and ocean by 2030. Madhu Rao, Chair of ������ϲʿ�������ֳ�ֱ�� WCPA, emphasizes: 

“Protected and Conserved areas are essential strategies to address both the climate crisis and biodiversity loss. As important carbon sinks, they will be increasingly vital to help us cope with climate change impacts. It is therefore critically important to secure biodiversity in these areas against industrial-scale exploitation, including mining and fossil fuel extraction, while recognizing Indigenous stewardship of such areas.”

The report calls for urgent and coordinated global action to bridge the gap between conservation commitments and the realities of industrial-scale exploitation of natural resources, including expanding the global network of protected and conserved areas and restricting industrial expansion in these areas.