The Nature Conservancy

August 10, 2021
We are living through a make-or-break chapter in the story of life on Earth. In the last 50 years alone, vertebrate populations have declined by 68 percent. Today, a full third of freshwater and marine species face extinction, while countless invertebrates could disappear before we realize their full importance to their ecosystems.

Humanity occupies a unique position in this climax. Our actions this decade could either restore the ecological balance or tip it, causing species that rely upon one another within ecosystems to fall like dominoes—with devastating outcomes for human well-being. However overwhelming it sounds, there is good news hidden in these facts: We can still change how this story unfolds.

We still have a chance to save species—and ourselves—if we act now.

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National Geographic

August 9, 2021
Climate change has already touched every corner of the planet and will continue to reshape the human experience for centuries to come, its impacts intensifying as warming grows, scientists warn.

The 2.0 degrees Fahrenheit (1.1 degrees Celsius) the planet has warmed since the preindustrial period has pushed Earth toward irreversible change, some of which is unavoidable. But decisive action to cut emissions quickly and thoroughly—keeping total temperature rise as low as possible—can greatly reduce the risks of crossing further dangerous thresholds that would put the planet even more at risk, according to a massive new Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report released Monday.

“In order to stabilize climate, we have to stop emitting immediately, full stop,” says Charles Koven, one of the report authors and a climate scientist at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California.

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New Straits Times

July 30, 2021
In mid-July, the Secretariat of the United Nations-administered Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) provided the first detailed look at a new Global Biodiversity Framework, on which nations will vote at a summit scheduled for Kunming, China, in October.

Once this is formally in place, it will establish goals and 21 specific targets that will guide global efforts this decade to preserve and protect nature and its essential services to people.

The target drawing most attention is one championed by the international Campaign for Nature — conserving at least 30 per cent of land and sea areas worldwide within equitably managed, ecologically-representative and well-connected protected area systems.

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The Print

July 26, 2021
Climate action failure, biodiversity loss and infectious diseases counted as the top three risks in the World Economic Forum’s Global Risks Report. It is imperative that leaders and citizens alike adopt a systems view for the economic and societal transformation needed today so we build the world we want to inhabit in 2030.

In 2015, world leaders came together for an ambitious commitment on fighting climate change to keep the world on a 1.5C pathway. In addition to governments that committed to the Paris Agreement, businesses aligned their plans and commitments to this vision. Companies with a combined revenue of over $11.4 trillion (equivalent to more than half of US GDP), are now pursuing net zero emissions by the end of the century, majority by 2050.

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One Earth - Commentary

July 23, 2021

The territories of Indigenous peoples and local communities contain 80% of the world’s remaining biodiversity and intersect about 40% of all terrestrial protected areas and ecologically intact landscapes. The Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) 2019 global assessment stressed the important role of these communities in biodiversity conservation by noting that 35% of the areas formally protected and 35% of all remaining terrestrial areas with very low human intervention are traditionally owned, managed, used, or occupied by Indigenous peoples.

Indigenous peoples sustain nature because we know we are a part of nature. We realize that trying to bend nature to our will would harm us as well as the animals, plants, and ecosystems we all depend on. Instead, Indigenous peoples have a reciprocal relationship with our territories. We know that if we take care of the land, the land will take care of us. And so, we honor our cultural responsibility to be careful stewards. When these relationships are respected and when the rights and responsibilities of Indigenous peoples are recognized and supported, the entire planet will benefit. Our territories span massive, vibrant areas that serve as sanctuaries for humans, animals, and plants; hold massive amounts of carbon; and ensure the health of our water and air. These lands—and the Indigenous relationship to them—have global significance, especially as governments seek ways to achieve increasingly urgent biodiversity and climate goals.

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Reuters

July 14, 2021
More than 10,000 species of plants and animals are at high risk of extinction due to the destruction of the Amazon rainforest - 35% of which has already been deforested or degraded, according to the draft of a landmark scientific report published on Wednesday.

Produced by the Science Panel for the Amazon (SPA), the 33-chapter report brings together research on the world's largest rainforest from 200 scientists from across the globe. It is the most detailed assessment of the state of the forest to date and both makes clear the vital role the Amazon plays in global climate and the profound risks it is facing.

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Green Queen

June 25, 2021
Until now, many of our global efforts to tackle biodiversity loss and climate change have been done separately from each other. Scientists are now calling for a new approach that takes both issues as intrinsically linked—we can’t solve one without the other.  

This is the core message of what is the first collaborative report between experts from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). According to the team of 50 scientists selected by the 12-person committee selected by the two bodies, biodiversity loss and climate change are both driven by human economic activities and are mutually reinforcing. 

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World Economic Forum

June 23, 2021
G7 leaders recently announced that “our world must not only become net zero, but also nature positive, for the benefit of both people and the planet.”

This represents a real paradigm shift in how nations, businesses, investors and consumers view nature. In the past, the mantra among a growing number of inspired leaders has been to do less harm, to reduce impact and to tread lightly across our world. Of course, this mantra remains.

But now there is a new worldview gathering pace: "nature positive." This asks: What if we go beyond damage limitation? What if our economic activities not only minimize impact, but also enhance ecosystems?

A nature positive approach enriches biodiversity, stores carbon, purifies water and reduces pandemic risk. In short, a nature positive approach enhances the resilience of our planet and our societies.

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World Economic Forum

June 21, 2021
The twin crises of nature loss and climate change are inextricably linked. For too long, however, biodiversity loss and climate change have been discussed and dealt with in siloes, even by independent international frameworks of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity and the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. We may, however, be at an important turning point.

For the first time, intergovernmental scientific bodies for each global challenge, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) have worked together on a report, which is the result of a co-sponsored workshop of 50 climate and biodiversity experts. The report finds that we can either solve both crises or solve neither.

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New Straits Times

June 16, 2021
Scientists and policymakers recognise that climate change and biodiversity loss are interconnected, but in practice they are largely addressed in their own domains.

Followers of the biodiversity loss crisis, therefore, welcomed last week's report on a joint workshop by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the Intergovernmental Platform on Science-Policy Advice on Ecosystems and Biodiversity (IPBES).

Since 1992, when the two issues (along with desertification) became the subject of individual United Nations treaties, biodiversity has never received the same level of global attention accorded to climate. However, neither will be successfully resolved unless they are tackled together and urgently. That was the main takeaway from the report by 50 leading experts jointly chosen by the IPCC and IPBES.

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Campaign for Nature

June 13, 2021
Today G7 Heads of State announced a joint commitment to a historic “Nature Compact” during their meeting in Cornwall, UK.  The Nature Compact is the most wide-ranging and ambitious set of coordinated actions to address the crisis facing nature ever agreed to by G7 countries. 

 Three of the Campaign for Nature’s key priorities feature prominently in the G7 Nature Compact, including:

• An agreement to support new global targets to protect and conserve at least 30% of global land and at least 30% of global ocean by 2030.  The agreement states that the nations will lead by example by effectively protecting and conserving the same percentage of their national land, inland waters and coastal and marine areas by 2030.   

• A commitment to prioritize the inclusion of Indigenous Peoples and local communities in co-design, decision-making and implementation of the systems change needed for the Nature Compact’s success.

• A pledge to dramatically increase investment in nature from all sources including the percentage of public climate finance directed towards nature.  

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Campaign for Nature

June 10, 2021

A new, peer-reviewed report by 50 climate and biodiversity experts released today asserts that biodiversity loss and climate change are both driven by human economic activities and mutually reinforce each other, and that neither will be successfully resolved unless both are tackled together. 

The report findings echo a recent communiqué by G7 leaders calling for greater and more coordinated climate and biodiversity action. 

Studies have shown that climate change is one of the main drivers of biodiversity loss and that ecosystems and species play a major function in regulating climate, as carbon sinks, as well as enhancing adaptation and resilience to climate change. 

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EcoWatch

May 24, 2021
The natural world is in a state of crisis, and we are to blame. We are in the midst of the Sixth Extinction, the biggest loss of species in the history of humankind. So many species are facing total annihilation. Nearly one-third of freshwater species are facing extinction. So are 40 percent of amphibians; 84 percent of large mammals; a third of reef-building corals; and nearly one-third of oak trees. Rhinos and elephants are being gunned down at rates so alarming that they could be completely wiped out from the wild by 2034. There may be fewer than 10 vaquita—a kind of porpoise endemic to Mexico's Gulf of California—due to illegal fishing nets, pesticides and irrigation. There are 130,000 plant species that could become extinct in our lifetimes. All told, about 28 percent of evaluated plant and animal species across the planet are now at risk of becoming extinct.

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Thomson Reuters

May 21, 2021
Seven of the world's most nature-rich national parks, from Angola to Bolivia and Indonesia, are set to receive $1 million annually for the next 15 years to help protect and manage their wildlife and plant species.

These "legacy landscapes" - so-called because of their natural beauty and importance in preserving the planet's fast-shrinking biodiversity - will benefit from a global fund aiming to attract $1 billion from governments and businesses this decade.

So far, Germany has made a contribution of nearly $100 million, with several private foundations pledging another $35 million.

France has also said it will put money next year into the Legacy Landscapes Fund (LLF), which plans to expand support to at least 30 protected areas if it reaches its $1 billion target this decade.

But conservation experts say far more finance is needed to reverse a catastrophic decline in biodiversity, with scientists warning in 2019 that about a million animals and plant species are at risk of extinction due to human activities.

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Campaign for Nature

May 22, 2021
On the occasion of World Biodiversity Day, a growing number of elected officials, Indigenous leaders, scientists, and other experts are calling on ASEAN leaders to endorse ambitious proposals to protect biodiversity and advance Indigenous rights through the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity.

After a year-long delay, the official negotiations of the Convention on Biological Diversity have resumed this month and are scheduled to conclude in Kunming, China this October. As delegates from 196 countries--including all of the ASEAN member states--participate in the negotiations, eyes are on the ASEAN region. As one of the most biodiverse regions on the planet, ASEAN member states have a crucial role to play in developing a successful global strategy to safeguard biodiversity. ASEAN is a leader of the Like-Minded Megadiverse  Countries that champion conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity since its inception in 2002 and harbours 70% of global biodiversity.

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