Decision 45 COM 7B.68

Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve (Mexico) (N 1290)

The World Heritage Committee,

1. Having examined Document WHC/23/45.COM/7B,
2. Recalling Decision 44 COM 7B.198 adopted at its extended 44th session (Fuzhou/online, 2021),
3. Appreciates the measures taken to ensure the maintenance of the ecological integrity of the property and restoration of degraded areas with the involvement of relevant government agencies and local communities;
4. Notes with utmost concern that illegal logging activities in the property have increased, and urges again the State Party to significantly increase efforts to halt the illegal logging in the property as a matter of priority;
5. Regrets that a number of threats including illegal logging, bushfires and land clearing are persisting and increasing, and requests the State Party to take appropriate actions, including by fully implementing the recommendations of the 2018 Reactive Monitoring mission to the property, to ensure these threats do not impact the Outstanding Universal Value (OUV) of the property, in particular the below:
   1. Ensure that inter-institutional efforts to detect and prevent illegal logging activities within the property are further strengthened in the longer-term and ensure reforestation activities are continued in areas of the property impacted by illegal logging,
   2. Develop and implement additional surveillance programmes to halt deforestation in the buffer zone caused by the expansion of avocado production, and reclaim and restore the affected areas,
   3. Continue programmes supporting involvement of local and indigenous communities in conservation activities and develop additional ways of providing alternative income for these communities;
6. Welcomes the confirmation by the State Party that no mining project has been authorized in the property or its buffer zone, however also requests the State Party to make a permanent commitment not to undertake any mining activity within the property, and to ensure that any such activities outside the property do not cause a negative impact on its OUV, including through impact assessment processes in line with the Guidance and Toolkit for Impact Assessments in a World Heritage Context;
7. Further requests the State Party to finalize as soon as possible the “Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve Management Program” and submit it to the World Heritage Centre and continue the implementation of its National Action Plan for the Conservation of the Monarch Butterfly;
8. Encourages the States Parties of Canada, Mexico and the United States of America to strengthen their actions to conserve the species in their territories, in particular through national-level protective legislation and minimizing the loss and restoring milkweed habitat, as well as through the trinational collaboration to provide adequate protection to the Monarch Butterfly and its habitat throughout its migratory corridor and requests furthermore the State Party of Mexico to report on these actions;
9. Also notes the consistent occurrence of colonies of Monarch Butterfly establishing themselves outside the boundaries of the property and again strongly encourages the State Party to develop a proposal for an extension of the property to ensure that areas consistently occupied by overwintering colonies of Monarch Butterfly outside the property are appropriately protected and to increase the potential of the property to effectively conserve its OUV under changing climatic conditions, and to provide an update on the progress of submitting a boundary modification in the next State of conservation report;
10. Further notes that adaptive measures were taken by the State Party to maintain an acceptable level of protection of the property during the COVID-19 pandemic and also encourages the State Party to restore management capacity following the pandemic to meet the current challenges in safeguarding the ecological integrity of the property and the associated OUV, in particular those that have arisen due to the impacts of the pandemic on illegal logging;
11. Finally requests the State Party to submit to the World Heritage Centre, by 1 December 2024, an updated report on the state of conservation of the property and the implementation of the above, for examination by the World Heritage Committee at its 47th session.