the united nations development programme undp is assisting the government of the republic of macedonia to implement a global environmental facility gef which aims to create an enabling environment for pa establishment and management in terms of policy governance institutional capacity and management knowhow the objective of the project is to conserve the country s biological diversity by strengthening the management effectiveness of the country s pa system as prescribed by its recent law on nature protection the proposed project will develop the institutional and systemic capacity of the country s pa agencies to i strengthen the national knowledge systems and apply appropriate technologies to support the design and development of a more representative and viable pa network ii strengthen the decisionsupport tools needed to secure the legal tenure of and expand the pas in the network and iii locally test these decisionsupport tools and mechanisms in the formal reproclamation processes of two pilot protected areas the project will seek to ensure that pa lands in the country graduate in status from poorly managed to wellmanaged