BBC Future

August 3, 2020
After defaulting on its substantial national debt, the Seychelles was offered an unusual deal.

Located around 1,600 kilometres (994 miles) off the coast of East Africa, the Seychelles is an ecological paradise. The archipelago of 115 lush and rocky islands sits amongst vast swathes of ocean, covering some 1.35 million square kilometres (521,000 square miles). They’re home to some of the world’s last pristine coral reefs and are teeming with endangered species, including the southern fin whale and the Indian Ocean’s only dugongs – large marine mammals also known as “sea cows”.

Read More

Asia Times

July 10, 2020
In the most comprehensive report to date on the economic implications of protecting nature, more than 100 economists and scientists find that the global economy would benefit from the establishment of far more protected areas on land and at sea than exist today.

The report considers various scenarios of protecting at least 30% of the planet to show that the benefits outweigh the costs by a ratio of at least 5-to-1. It offers new evidence that the nature conservation sector drives economic growth, delivers key non-monetary benefits, and is a net contributor to a resilient global economy.

Read More

Phys.org

July 8, 2020
In the most comprehensive report to date on the economic implications of protecting nature, over 100 economists and scientists find that the global economy would benefit from the establishment of far more protected areas on land and at sea than exist today. The report considers various scenarios of protecting at least 30% of the world's land and ocean to find that the benefits outweigh the costs by a ratio of at least 5-to-1. The report offers new evidence that the nature conservation sector drives economic growth, delivers key non-monetary benefits and is a net contributor to a resilient global economy.

Read More

Latercera

July 9, 2020
A recent report ensures that the conservation, restoration and creation of protected areas that cover around 30% of biodiversity and nature - terrestrial and marine - would generate enormous economic and financial benefits on a global scale and, furthermore, avoid the alarming collapse of the natural world that now threatens the extinction of up to a million species. Although for this, it is necessary, it is necessary to increase the investment to approximately 140 billion dollars on average in the next ten years, versus the 24 billion dollars today.

The study called " Protection of 30% of the planet for nature: costs, benefits and economic implications " , was prepared with the work of more than 100 scientists and economists who are part of the Campaign for Nature and Peoples (promoted by National Geographic and the Wyss Foundation). This is the most comprehensive global assessment of the financial and economic impacts of protected areas to date, and considers sectors such as agriculture, fisheries and forestry.

Read More

WEF Blog

July 8, 2020
[…] A comprehensive report, Protecting 30% of the planet for nature: costs, benefits and economic implications, has arrived just in time. It concludes that the benefits of protecting 30% of the world’s land and ocean outweigh the costs by a factor of at least 5:1. This economic assessment follows the urgent call from scientists to protect at least 30% of the earth’s land and sea by 2030 to halt the collapse of biodiversity.

The IMF estimates that $10 trillion has been spent so far on official COVID-19 support measures worldwide, and forecasts global GDP will contract by an unprecedented 4.9% in 2020. Protecting 30% of the world’s land and ocean would require just 0.016% of global GDP. This seems like a very low insurance premium and incredibly safe bet on a system that has proven its sound productivity for over 3 billion years.

Read More

The Guardian

July 8, 2020
Nearly a third of the world’s oceans and land area could be placed under environmental protections without harming the global economy, and even produce bumper economic benefits if the right policies were followed, according to a global assessment.

Ecosystems around the world are collapsing or hovering on the brink of disaster, with a million species threatened with extinction. But if at least 30% of the planet’s land and oceans were subject to conservation efforts, that mass extinction could be avoided and vital habitats restored, scientists estimate.

Read More

Campaign for Nature

July 8, 2020
In the most comprehensive report to date on the economic implications of protecting nature, over 100 economists and scientists find that the global economy would benefit from the establishment of far more protected areas on land and at sea than exist today. The report considers various scenarios of protecting at least 30% of the world’s land and ocean to find that the benefits outweigh the costs by a ratio of at least 5-to-1. The report offers new evidence that the nature conservation sector drives economic growth, delivers key non-monetary benefits and is a net contributor to a resilient global economy.

Read More

Reuters

July 8, 2020
With Earth’s wildlife now facing an extinction crisis, a group of economists and scientists is hoping to persuade governments that it pays to protect nature.

Specifically, expanding areas under conservation could yield a return of at least $5 for every $1 spent just by giving nature more room to thrive.

That in turn would boost agricultural and forestry yields, improve freshwater supplies, preserve wildlife and help fight climate change – all of which would boost global economic output on average by about $250 billion (199.38 billion pounds) annually, the group of more than 100 researchers argues in a paper published Wednesday.

Read More

WEF Blog

July 1, 2020
The most destructive way to obtain food from the ocean is bottom trawling. Especially egregious are the ships called 'supertrawlers', the largest fishing vessels in the world. Their nets, which are large enough to hold a dozen 747 jets, destroy everything in their paths, including 1,000-year-old deep corals.

Surprisingly, bottom trawling is allowed within some marine protected areas (MPAs) in the UK. Even worse, according to a recent Greenpeace investigation, 25 supertrawlers spent almost 3,000 hours fishing – legally – in 39 different MPAs in the UK in 2019.

Read More

Indian Flash

June 20, 2020
From former Heads of State to former Foreign Ministers, everyone has joined together against the destruction of the natural world, noting that it has a bearing upon the health, economies and well being of mankind. The world lenders have come together under Campaign for Nature’s Global Steering Committee with an aim of reaching out to the world leaders to support a new global goal to protect at least 30 percent of the planet’s land and ocean by 2030.

Noting that land and marine conservation is timelier than ever, they said that Covid 19 pandemic has further underscored the need to protect more of the natural world. Several studies have shown that destruction of nature increased the risk of infectious disease, they added.

Read More

The Guardian

June 17, 2020
Pandemics such as coronavirus are the result of humanity’s destruction of nature, according to leaders at the UN, WHO and WWF International, and the world has been ignoring this stark reality for decades.

The illegal and unsustainable wildlife trade as well as the devastation of forests and other wild places were still the driving forces behind the increasing number of diseases leaping from wildlife to humans, the leaders told the Guardian.

Pandemics such as coronavirus are the result of humanity’s destruction of nature, according to leaders at the UN, WHO and WWF International, and the world has been ignoring this stark reality for decades.

The illegal and unsustainable wildlife trade as well as the devastation of forests and other wild places were still the driving forces behind the increasing number of diseases leaping from wildlife to humans, the leaders told the Guardian.

Read More

The Guardian

June 17, 2020
In 1997, a large area of rainforest in south-east Asia was burned to the ground to make way for palm oil plantations. A combination of deforestation, forest fires and drought are believed to have forced hundreds of fruit bats away from their natural habitats towards fruit orchards planted in close proximity to intensive pig farms. These conditions led to the emergence of the Nipah virus, which spilled over from infected bats to pigs, and from pigs to pig farmers. Over the next two years, the disease would kill more than 100 people. This should have served as a warning.

Now, 20 years later, we are facing a health crisis of an altogether different scale, with Covid-19 causing the most tragic health, social and economic crisis in living memory.

Read More

HAC

June 5, 2020
We are joining forces to call on all governments around the world to retain our precious intact ecosystems and wilderness, to preserve and effectively manage at least 30% of our planet’s lands and oceans by 2030, and to restore and conserve biodiversity, as a crucial step to help prevent future pandemics and public health emergencies, and lay the foundations for a sustainable global economy through job creation and human well-being. 

 The rapid and devastating spread of COVID-19 is a tragedy with monumental impacts on people, economies and societies that will endure for years to come. This pandemic provides unprecedented and powerful proof that nature and people share the same fate and are far more closely linked that most of us realized. 

Read More

Fast Company

May 20, 2020

Over the next decade, the European Union plans to plant 3 billion trees. It’s one piece of a larger commitment to protect nature on the continent at a time when a million species, globally, are now at risk of extinction, and biodiversity loss also threatens future pandemics. In a new strategy document, the European Commission says it now aims to protect 30% of the region’s land and oceans, based on science that suggests that amount is necessary to preserve biodiversity.

“This is the first truly serious biodiversity strategy at a large scale that we’ve seen,” says Brian O’Donnell, director of the nonprofit Campaign for Nature. “It’s a continent-wide strategy. It’s an all-of-government strategy. It addresses both conserving and protecting the best of nature that remains and restoring new areas. . . . The tree-planting component of it I think is something that will get a number of people’s attention. But it’s only one part of what I think is a comprehensive biodiversity strategy both for Europe.”

Read More

ABC

May 17, 2020
There’s a serious campaign underway to have 30 per cent of the Earth designated as a giant conservation area. The target date is 2030.

But that’s just the start. The scientists and environmentalists involved in the plan want to eventually lock down half the planet. It’s about protecting habitats and biodiversity.

Cost and logistics are primary considerations. But they aren’t the only ones. Other issues at stake include increasing poverty and indigenous rights.

Read More