Three Italian parks have been included in the IUCN Green List

The Tuscan Archipelago National Park and the Casentino Forests National Park have joined the prestigious “Green list“ of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). The Gran Paradiso National Park has been confirmed on this list for the third time since 2014. The official announcement came on 20 April from the Swiss headquarters of the IUCN, the world’s largest nature conservation organisation.

The Green List of Protected Areas was introduced by IUCN following the 10-yearly World Parks Congress in 2014. This is an official, international award that recognises the most virtuous protected areas, i.e. those that have achieved success in the conservation and environmental protection projects for which they were created. This success goes beyond the borders of individual areas, as it protects the very biodiversity of the planet and can provide tangible help in tackling environmental (and other) issues such as climate change, availability of food and water and human well-being. In order to obtain recognition, it is necessary to meet the quality requirements of IUCN’s Global Standard, both in terms of ecosystem protection and management quality. But that’s not all: another parameter to be judged is the level of integration in the socio-economic context of the territories, as well as the capacity of the protected areas to be functional to sustainable development and ecological transition.

With the support of Federparchi (the Italian Federation of Parks and Nature Reserves), several national parks and marine protected areas have begun the procedure for admission to the “Green List”, a recognition that represents an incentive for other national parks and marine protected areas to continue the process for achieving excellence in the management of our natural heritage.