Environmental Trends 2002

Protected Areas

Is British Columbia’s rich ecosystem diversity protected?

Percentage of Ecosystems Protected

Sources: Ministry of Sustainable Resource Management, Decision Support Services, 2002. Notes: The delineations represent ecosections, as described in Ecoregions of British Columbia, D. Demarchi, 1993, except for the 12 marine ecosections, which are found in The Marine Ecoregions of British Columbia, D.E. Howes, M.A. Zacharias and J.R. Harper, 1996.

Is British Columbia’s rich ecosystem diversity protected?

• An ecological classification system divides British Columbia into 112 ecosections, representing different ecosystem types. Twelve of these are predominantly marine.

• A provincial objective is to increase the protection of ecosystem diversity. The amount of protection will vary with each ecosection.

• Significant progress has been made in improving ecosystem representation in the protected areas system (see table).

• Some areas of the province such as the most northern, the north east and some marine ecosystems, still have less than 1% protected.

For detailed information, including graph data, see In-Depth report [pdf].