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100+ organizations voice concern at low ambition of biodiversity negotiations
An unprecedented joint call by NGOs, business coalitions, faith-based groups, youth, indigenous peoples, local and regional governments, academics and artists for governments to strengthen the draft biodiversity agreement ahead of the 15th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in Kunming, China in October to ensure a positive world for nature this decade.
The post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework is currently being negotiated by governments under the auspices of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity. It presents a once-in-a-decade opportunity for the world to secure a global agreement to halt and reverse the loss of nature, but the pace of negotiations has been slow and lacking in ambition.
The growing concern from leading organizations is over the lack of ambition displayed by governments negotiating the agreement. NGOs, faith groups, local and regional governments, Indigenous Peoples, academics, youth, business coalitions and artists are united in calling for governments to deliver an ambitious agreement at COP15 that reverses biodiversity loss to secure a nature-positive world by 2030.
Human activities are causing a catastrophic loss of biodiversity, with one million species now threatened by extinction. This destruction of nature undermines its ability to support us, placing human health and livelihoods at risk.
The signatories, which include leading academics, stress that reversing biodiversity loss is a moral responsibility, but it will also help avoid future pandemics, fight climate change and land degradation, and enhance environmental security. Continued loss of nature threatens not only half of global GDP, but also our opportunities to uphold human rights, and reduce social and gender inequalities.
The strong presence of humanitarian and development organizations among the signatories reflects biodiversity loss’ role in undermining human security and the need for connected action for nature and people.
Crucially, the call to governments highlights the commitments made by many world leaders in the past year to reverse biodiversity loss by 2030, through the Leaders’ Pledge for Nature and the G7 2030 Nature Compact.
Leaders are called on to deliver an ambitious global biodiversity agreement which acts on these commitments.
To secure a nature-positive world by 2030, governments are urged to include a nature-positive mission in the post-2020 global biodiversity framework, and to ensure a rights-based approach, including to nature-based solutions and to conserving 30% of land, freshwater and seas by 2030.
Governments are further called on to ensure the final agreement tackles the drivers of biodiversity loss - including unsustainable agriculture and food systems, forestry, fisheries, infrastructure, and extractives - by securing a just transition that halves the footprint of production and consumption by 2030. Other key areas of the draft agreement that need strengthening include ensuring adequate financial resources and an effective implementation mechanism.
Marco Lambertini, Director General of WWF International, said:
“The world has woken up to the enormous threat nature loss poses, not only to the natural world we have the duty to coexist with, but also to human lives and livelihoods. The post-2020 global biodiversity framework offers governments a once-in-a-decade opportunity to change course, yet the draft agreement falls short in a number of key areas, including in failing to address the economic drivers of nature loss and the re-direction of financial flows towards a nature-positive transition. Diverse voices from across society are sounding the alarm that commitments from world leaders are not translating into a strong plan of action. Governments must urgently work to strengthen the draft agreement ahead of COP15 to secure a nature-positive world by 2030.”
