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IPAs are key sites for exceptional botanical richness; rare, threatened and socio-economically valuable plant species; and rare and threatened habitats.
Find out how they’re identified, how they help wild plants on a global scale and how you can support this vital work.
Important Plant Areas (IPAs) have never been more important. They are some of the most vital places on Earth for wild plant diversity.
They are a globally recognised tool for protecting rare and threatened plants, valuable species with cultural or economic significance, and endangered habitats. In the face of nearly 2 in 5 plant species potentially threatened with extinction, understanding where these species and habitats are found has never been more important.
Once identified, IPAs can be prioritised for targeted management and conservation actions to safeguard and restore the species and habitats within them. With a huge number of plants needing conservation attention worldwide, this prioritisation means we can focus our efforts to maximise impact.
In collaboration with partners worldwide, Plantlife is working to expand our existing knowledge base to support the identification, recognition, management, monitoring and conservation of globally significant sites for wild plants and threatened habitats.
IPAs are also a globally recognised tool for protecting valuable species with cultural or economic significance, and related local and traditional knowledge on species use and its endangered habitats.
These plant-rich places sustain resilient ecosystems, in three important ways:
The world is facing a biodiversity crisis, with species and ecosystems disappearing faster than ever. Their loss threatens the natural systems and essential resources that sustain our lives, with profound environmental, social and economic consequences.
But we know that conservation action works and IPAs have a critical role in halting the decline of plants globally. We must use tools and approaches like IPAs if we are to protect the essential resources and functions that sustain the Earth’s ecosystems and, by extension, all life.
IPAs are places of outstanding botanical and ecological importance. They are identified through a strategic, community- and data-led approach that helps people recognise, understand and protect the planet’s richest places for plant species and habitats.
More than 70 countries have been involved in creating IPAs across the world, and more than 2,500 sites have been identified.
Plantlife developed IPAs more than 20 years ago and has been instrumental in its uptake and traction – particularly across Europe and the wider Mediterranean region.
We work closely on IPAs with other organisations like Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, which developed its Tropical Important Plant Areas (TIPAs) programme in 2015, covering a total of 9 countries in tropical South America, Africa and Asia. We also work with local partners in-country to help implement IPA national programmes, across multiple sectors and scales.
More than 70 countries are now involved in IPA work across the globe. Several other countries are starting the process; some are specifically doing do so to implement the actions of the Global Strategy for Plant Conservation (GSPC) and to meet the targets of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF).
IPAs and their associated data and management are also relevant to other international frameworks such as the IUCN Red Listing of species and of Ecosystems, and the Key Biodiversity Areas (KBA) programme.
Biodiversity-inclusive land and sea-use planning to prevent habitat loss.
Restore 30% of degraded ecosystems by 2030.
Conserve 30% of land, freshwater, and ocean areas by 2030 (“30×30”).
Halt species extinctions and recover threatened species.
Reduce climate change impacts on biodiversity and build ecosystem resilience.
Ensure sustainable use and management of wild species for people and nature.
Maintain and restore nature’s benefits to people, including water, food, disaster protection, and climate regulation.
Ensure inclusive, equitable participation and rights in biodiversity decision-making, especially for Indigenous Peoples, local communities, women, youth, and persons with disabilities.
Achieve gender equality in biodiversity conservation and decision-making.
Important Plant Areas around the world are home to hundreds of the most threatened species and cover vast areas of the most threatened habitats.
Although they are not legally designated protected areas, their identification can lead to formal levels of legal protection. Effective protection and conservation of sites must happen through sensitively balancing the benefits to species and habitats with improving the lives and livelihoods of the communities living alongside these.
IPA programmes take an inclusive, bottom-up approach. From the outset, they bring people together and recognise different forms of knowledge, values and perspectives.
Important Plant Areas have also been shown to support better decision-making for site-based conservation, such as developing conservation management plans, avoiding development in sensitive areas, and guiding financial investments to prevent biodiversity loss. The data generated can also feed into national and international policy-making, strategies and plans.
IPAs can help to raise national awareness of and pride in the biodiversity of a country, acting as a means of stimulating local interest in plant species and habitats through education programmes.
Temperate rainforests are among the world's rarest and most biodiverse ecosystems. And yet, despite their ecological importance, they remain largely overlooked in global conservation efforts.
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