Events

UN Biodiversity summit

At the UN Biodiversity summit held September 30 in New York, the Secretary General Antonio Guteres observed that “humanity is waging war on nature and we need to rebuild our relationship with it work in harmony with it rather against it”. He noted that “none of 2020 biodiversity targets agreed in Aichi will be achieved and that “Biodiversity and sustainable ecosystems are central to achieving our Sustainable Development Goals but too often environmental health is down played”.

He proposed three solutions –

• Nature based solutions to speed post Covid 19 recovery
• Changing economic accounting systems to include the benefits of biodiversity
• Securing targets to protect biodiversity and enhancing sustainable ecosystems

[youtube UN biodiversity summit] [Aichi biodiversity targets]

Leaders pledge for Nature

As has now become an annual custom , the United Nations is hosting on 30 September a major Biodiversity summit to back the Leaders Pledge for Nature which many of the World’s leaders have signed. The 10 point plan includes commitments to put wild life and the climate at the heart of the post pandemic economic recovery plans.

The background to these pledges is that the ‘Science shows biodiversity loss, land and ocean degradation, pollution, resource depletion and climate change are accelerating at an unprecedented rate. This acceleration is causing irreversible harm to our life support systems and aggravating poverty and inequalities as well as hunger and nutrition’
[Guardian newspaper 28/09/2020]