MEDIA STATEMENT
President Biden’s National Target to Protect 30% of U.S. Lands and Oceans by 2030
WASHINGTON, DC (27 January 2021) — The Campaign for Nature, issued the following statement:
Enric Sala, Explorer in Residence, National Geographic and the author of the award winning book The Nature of Nature, Why We Need the Wild. @enric_sala
Today's announcement by President Biden is a win for the people of the United States and the rest of the world, the environment, and the economy. Only by protecting the earth's climate and biodiversity can we truly be on a path to an inclusive and prosperous future for humanity.
By promising to set the United States on a path to conserve 30% of the U.S by 2030 (30x30) – on land and at sea – President Biden has proposed the most ambitious conservation agenda of any president in American history. Such vision addresses the scale of the challenges facing our climate and the natural world. Only by rapidly accelerating the pace of conservation will we stand a chance to slow the warming of our planet and prevent a climate catastrophe, and to reverse the loss of biodiversity, which many experts have warned is the beginning of a Sixth Mass Extinction and the collapse of humanity’s life support system.
Protecting our natural heritage will ensure equitable access to the outdoors for all Americans, build and diversify rural economies, demonstrate America’s commitment to addressing the climate crisis, empower Tribal Nations to safeguard their traditional and cultural resources, help mend our nation’s urban/rural divide, and restore America’s traditional, international leadership role in conservation.
Brian O’Donnell, Director, Campaign for Nature
We rely on nature for our food, our water, our shelter. Nature produces the world’s oxygen and regulates our climate. For too long we have acted as if nature’s bounty was inexhaustible. Now, the world is facing a biodiversity crisis with up to one million species threatened with extinction including varieties of butterflies, sea turtles and conifers. The largest driver of this crisis is habitat loss.
President Biden, through today’s announcement setting a national target to protect 30% of our lands and oceans, is providing the leadership we need to safeguard nature. We will never regret saving too much nature, we will only regret the failure to do so.
Today’s action signals to the more than 50 nations that have called for protecting at least 30% of the world’s lands and oceans by 2030 that the U.S. will contribute to those efforts and work towards a healthier planet. Now, the Biden Administration must work to implement this ambitious goal, support the 30x30 target at the global level, and dramatically increase financial investment in conservation.
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The Campaign for Nature works with scientists, Indigenous Peoples, and a growing coalition of over 100 conservation organizations around the world who are calling on policymakers to commit to clear and ambitious targets to be agreed upon at the 15th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity in Kunming, China in 2021 to protect at least 30% of the planet by 2030 and working with Indigenous leaders to ensure full respect for Indigenous rights.