Multiple methodological approaches have been used for identifying areas of importance for the conservation of biodiversity, resulting in a diverse portfolio of sites at the regional, national and international scale. In addition, the different components of interest in natural ecosystems from genes to nature contributions to people require dynamic, adaptive, and participative processes that fulfill diverse conservation objectives. Such complexity is increased within the recent updates of legal frameworks within diverse decision making scales. Recent global initiatives such as the Red List of Ecosystem and the Key Biodiversity Areas have been adopted by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and are expected to be included in the Post-2020 agenda, inviting member countries and organization to implement them at the national level, which requires to articulate this efforts with existing frameworks not only methodologically but also in the conservation discourse with local actors. At national and regional scales within megadiverse countries, such as Colombia, this panorama is challenging, specially based on the specific guidelines and goals defined within the country and the need to integrate methodologies with information about threats for biodiversity, and regional and local heterogenous constraints for conservation, while drivers of biodiversity loss are continuing or even increasing. Also such approaches should be constructed and appropriated by local actors allowing its knowledge of opportunities and early warnings. In this workshop we will present and discuss with participants the methodological and governance approaches that Colombia has established to formulate area based conservation goals and to identify areas of importance and ecological singularity, considering spatially explicit information of different aspects of biodiversity as well as socio-economic information, and current collaboration with international organizations to articulate these efforts with the Key Biodiversity Areas initiative. This workshop will be of great interest to participants that represent private or public organizations responsible for producing technical inputs for the prioritization of conservation actions at the local level in other countries.