Summary Paper

For those interested in further information, there are two other documents available online:

A full collection of original comments/postings submitted online, organized by topic (84 pages, in English)

Summaries of the statements (14 pages, in English)

The IUCN Discussion Forum is now closed. We are very grateful to all those who have contributed to the revision process of the IUCN Protected Area Management Categories by sharing your views through the E-Discussion Forum.

The papers posted on the E-Discussion Forum were viewed almost 5,000 times and generated 60 individual commentaries about different issues. The papers on the definition, the different categories and the use of the Categories System were the most interesting for both viewers and commenters. All other topics also received a noteworthy amount of attention by the site’s visitors

The above summary paper is a distilled version of the collection of all comments posted on the E-Discussion Forum web pages. This summary is not intended to interpret or judge the comments received but to note the key issues arising from these comments.