ABSTRACT
By 2016, over 15% of the world's land area and 3.4% of the oceans were protected, with every country having a protected area system. This includes protection for plants, animals, geology, cultural heritage, and whole ecological communities and processes. In fact, many protected forests across Europe remained intact because of their role as hunting grounds of the nobility. Whatever our view on protected areas, it seems that for many plants and animals to survive, human beings must take steps to protect their habitats, which confers on our species a special responsibility. In Europe, most protected areas are lived-in, cultural landscapes. The Forest of Dean in England, for example, was a royal hunting forest in the eleventh century ce that was subsequently encroached by mining communities over hundreds of years before being designated a National Forest Park in 1938. It now comprises a mosaic of special areas protected for landscape and biodiversity alongside established urban settlements.
