Global Marine Protected Area Targets

History of International Efforts
The 17th International Union for Conservation of Nature General Assembly, the 19th IUCN assembly and the fourth World Parks Congress all proposed to centralise the establishment of protected areas. The World Summit on Sustainable Development in 2002 called for the establishment of marine protected areas consistent with international laws and based on scientific information, including representative networks by 2012. The Evian agreement, signed by G8 Nations in 2003, agreed to these terms. The Durban Action Plan, developed in 2003, called for regional action and targets to establish a network of protected areas by 2010 within the jurisdiction of regional Environmental science|environmental protocols. It recommended establishing protected areas for 20 to 30% of the world's oceans by the goal date of 2012. The Convention on Biological Diversity considered these recommendations and recommended requiring nations to set up marine parks that are controlled by a central organization before merging them. The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change agreed to the terms laid out by the convention.

"'The establishment by 2010 of terrestrial and by 2012 for marine areas of comprehensive, effectively managed, and ecologically representative national and regional systems of protected areas that collectively, inter alia through a global network, contribute to achieving the three objectives of the Convention and the 2010 target to significantly reduce the current late of biodiversity loss at the global, regional, national, and sub-national levels and contribute to poverty reduction and the pursuit of sustainable development.'"