Photograph by: Enric Sala, National Geographic
January 11, 2021
A coalition of more than 50 countries has committed to protect almost a third of the planet by 2030 to halt the destruction of the natural world and slow extinctions of wildlife.
The High Ambition Coalition (HAC) for Nature and People, which includes the UK and countries from six continents, made the pledge to protect at least 30% of the planet’s land and oceans before the One Planet summit in Paris on Monday, hosted by the French president, Emmanuel Macron.
January 11, 2021
Biodiversity loss is one of the most pressing challenges humanity faces today. All the recently published reports on biodiversity – the Global Assessment Report on Biodiversity and Ecosystems, the Living Planet Report, the Global Forest Resources Assessment Report and the Global Biodiversity Outlook – toll alarm bells pointing out the failure of global commitments in terms of biodiversity conservation.
According to the Living Planet Index (LPI) 2020, decline was captured for the 68% of the monitored population (i.e. 20,811 populations of 4,392 species) for the period of 1970-2016.
The LPI “is a measure of the state of the world’s biological diversity based on population trends of vertebrate species from terrestrial, freshwater and marine habitats adopted by the Convention of Biological Diversity (CBD) to track the progress”.
January 8, 2021
For four years, science has been under attack by an administration that has dismantled over 125 environmental policies, spanning protections for federal lands and endangered species to regulations that ensure clean air and water.
The Trump presidency has cost the planet valuable time in the fight against climate change and biodiversity loss. Additionally, the harm to scientific integrity, public trust and the United States’ international reputation will linger well beyond Trump’s tenure.
The Biden White House will represent a new day — and new hope — in the fight for environmental protection and climate action. Under the Biden-Harris administration, America has the opportunity to rebuild our stature in the world and assert our leadership in combating the climate crisis. The Biden transition website contains numerous policies that have reinvigorated scientists and those who care about the environment, including plans to rejoin the Paris Climate Accord, reach net-zero emissions by 2050, invest in environmental justice and conserve 30 percent of the nation’s land and water by 2030.
January 7, 2021
With COVID-19 vaccinations underway in some countries and efforts to expand access still ongoing, world leaders will soon shift their attention from crisis response to pandemic recovery. Governments have already committed $12 trillion to the COVID-19 response, and there will be strong pressure to keep investing in a return to the pre-pandemic “normal.” But that would be a mistake.
Putting aside budget constraints, we have just seen that the pre-pandemic normal had dire implications for the world. Our strained interactions with the environment helped introduce the coronavirus to humans, our hyperconnected global economy allowed it to spread like wildfire, and its especially deadly effects on the most vulnerable populations have highlighted the consequences of deep-seated social and economic inequalities within and between countries.
January 6, 2021
When faced with major and unprecedented challenges, humanity across the globe has time and again united to share knowledge, information, resources, and more to collectively overcome the obstacles. As much has been evident during this ongoing pandemic, with efforts being taken on an unprecedented scale to annihilate this virus for good. Global cooperation and collaboration have been the hallmarks of our battle against the current invisible adversary.
Over the past several decades, this collaborative approach is being consistently used to deal with many threats that loom over most parts for the world—right from food shortages and extinction of species, to global warming and climate change. In 2021, such coalitions will once again take place—hopefully with a renewed cooperative spirit—in the form of several international events and conferences.
January 5, 2021
To stop biodiversity loss, Canada recently committed to protecting 30% of its land and sea by 2030. But making conservation decisions about where to locate new protected areas is complicated. It depends on data both about biodiversity and about a range of benefits (e.g. freshwater, climate regulation, recreation) that people get from nature. Surprisingly, despite the size of the country, new mapping suggests that less than 1% of Canada's land (0.6% of total area or approximately 56,000 km2) is a hot spot, providing all these benefits in one place. Moreover, the study published today in Environmental Research Letters suggests that some of the most critical areas where people receive these key benefits from nature do not occur within currently protected areas and may be threatened by current or future natural resource extraction.
December 31, 2020
Since 1970, 4,392 mammals, amphibians, birds, fish and reptile species’ population sizes declined by 68 percent, according to a World Wildlife Fund report released this year. Animals living in Latin America and the Caribbean took the biggest hit; their population sizes decreased by 94 percent. Habitat destruction is cited as the leading cause of these massive losses. The United Nations’ Global Biodiversity Outlook report produced similarly grim results. The document took inventory of 196 countries committed to recovering biodiversity as determined by the 2010 Aichi Biodiversity Targets. As dictated by the Aichi agreement’s ten-year plan, countries were to achieve certain recovery milestones like preventing the spread of invasive species and conserving protected areas. Most of the goals were not achieved or only partially met.
December 29, 2020
Two United Nations (UN) mega meetings on biodiversity and climate change next year are expected to set new targets and reaffirm old pledges.
The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change has scheduled its 26th Conference of Parties (COP26) in Glasgow, the United Kingdom, a summit that will serve as a de facto deadline for countries to increase their 2030 goals under the Paris Climate Agreement.
Meanwhile, talks are underway on revised global targets under the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), scheduled for agreement in Kunming, China, at the 15th meeting of the convention's member nations (COP15).
December 24, 2020
Nature-based solutions to tackling climate change will be a big talking point in 2021, as countries, companies and investors step up their efforts to cut carbon.
But few people know what they are. Essentially, they are alternatives to traditional ‘gray’ infrastructure such as dams, seawalls and reservoirs that involve a lot of concrete and are often only temporary fixes for problems such as flooding, water scarcity and quality, or soil erosion.
More formally, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) says nature-based solutions are “actions to protect, sustainably manage, and restore natural or modified ecosystems, that address societal challenges effectively and adaptively, simultaneously providing human well-being and biodiversity benefits”.
December 23, 2020
The world is facing an ongoing sixth mass extinction. To curb this human-caused loss of global biodiversity, many countries have made commitments to protect and conserve large areas of land in the coming decades. But the fate of the Indigenous peoples, local communities, and Afro-descendants who live on these lands remains unclear.
A new study conducted by the Rights and Resources Initiative (RRI) in collaboration with the Campaign for Nature addresses the risks these groups face from exclusionary conservation measures and urges decision-makers to adopt rights-based conservation approaches.
December 22, 2020
The year 2020 was always destined to be a crucial one for biodiversity, with the Cop15 conference in Kunming, China scheduled for October, at which the international community was expected to agree a Paris-style agreement for nature. But the arrival of the coronavirus pandemic across the world forced biodiversity on to the agenda in a way previously unseen.
Despite the postponement of Cop15, there was a flurry of activity among the world’s leading figures on the environment as it became clear that the state of our planet has never been more urgent. In March, John Vidal was among the first to report on the link between our destruction of nature and Covid-19 – and the warnings continued.
December 21, 2020
Scotland is famous for whiskey, haggis and stunning scenery; rolling hills, snow-capped mountains and more than 30,000 freshwater lochs. It is also home to around 90,000 species of animals, microbes and plants.
Now, plans are being proposed to protect as much as one-third of its nature. If enacted, the new laws will help safeguard Scottish biodiversity and the natural economy, which has been valued at around $39 billion.
“Dealing with the twin crises of climate change and biodiversity loss is one of the most important challenges of this generation,” Scotland’s Environment Secretary, Roseanna Cunningham said, announcing the project.
December 21, 2020
Climate mitigation technologies that harness natural processes to reduce or remove greenhouse gas -- plays an important role in mitigating the devastating effects of global warming, which is expected to reach 1.5 degrees Celsius between 2030 and 2052, according to the projection by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
Global warming has contributed to sea level rise and increased incidences of extreme and deadly weather events, researchers have found.
With the potential mitigation impact of 11 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide annually, NCS can provide over a third of the mitigation action needed to meet the Paris agreement targets by 2030, says the report issued by Conservation International, DBS Bank, National University of Singapore (NUS) and Temasek.
December 21, 2020
As Canada embarks on a massive effort to address climate change and the loss of nature, while fighting a simultaneous battle against COVID-19, Nature-based Solutions hold the promise of tackling the economic and ecological challenges we face today.
The International Union for the Conservation of Nature identifies Nature-based Solutions as "actions to protect, sustainably manage, and restore natural or modified ecosystems, that address societal challenges effectively and adaptively, simultaneously providing human well-being and biodiversity benefits".
Nature-based Solutions sound a lot like a convenient repackaging of familiar calls to protect nature, for our own sake and for the sake of the planet. What sets NbS apart, however, is the systematic approach that it demands and its multiple benefits for people, our economy, for Indigenous reconciliation and for human well-being.
December 21, 2020
To slow extinctions and climate change, President-elect Joe Biden has embraced a plan to conserve 30 percent of U.S. land and 30 percent of its ocean waters by 2030. It is perhaps the most ambitious commitment to conservation by a U.S. president. How he proceeds will determine whether he unites or further divides Americans in a pivotal decade for the planet.
The plan is known as “30 by 30.” Behind the catchy phrase is a simple, scientifically informed belief that conserving 30 percent of the planet’s land and 30 percent of its water is required to protect roughly 75 percent of Earth’s species and slow climate change by storing carbon in plants and soil. In the words of a former interior secretary, Bruce Babbitt, 30 by 30 is “a kind of synthesizing, consolidating, organizing possibility.”
