Background: how Colombia counts conservation, with a protected area system and a separate OMEC category

Background

When Colombia reported its conservation area at the biodiversity Conference of the Parties, it used two separate counts. One is the Sistema Nacional de Areas Protegidas, the national protected area system. The other is OMEC, the Spanish abbreviation for other effective area-based conservation measures, which is counted apart from that system and can include private land. The Reserva Natural Privada Aguila Arpia, for instance, is an OMEC and is not part of the national protected area system. Both counts feed Target 3 of Colombia's Biodiversity Action Plan, which seeks 30 per cent of territory under conservation by 2030. The Conference of the Parties, usually shortened to COP, is the decision-making body of the Convention on Biological Diversity, and its seventeenth session met in Yerevan in Armenia. The conservation status of species is tracked separately by the IUCN, which lists the giant otter and the pink river dolphin as endangered.