Going Beyond Climate Change: The Cost of Biodiversity Loss

Published on Wednesday, October 15, 2008 by Inter Press Service
Going Beyond Climate Change: The Cost of Biodiversity Loss
by Ramesh Jaura

BARCELONA – While the financial mayhem continues to draw the headlines, the cost of
persistent biodiversity loss has yet to be established. But it is believed to be
bigger than that of the meltdown, and in many cases also irreparable.

While the financial mayhem continues to draw the headlines, the cost of persistent
biodiversity loss has yet to be established. But it is believed to be bigger than
that of the meltdown, and in many cases also irreparable. (Image: BBC media)The
International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) now plans to gather
incontrovertible evidence on the value of preserving biodiversity and the cost of
losing it. The world’s oldest and largest global environmental network will task its
scientific commissions for this.

This is one eminent pillar of the immediate and strategic priorities of the IUCN as
spelt out by the organisation’s new president Ashok Khosla.

The idea, backed by IUCN’s ten-day world conservation congress that concluded
Tuesday (Oct 14) in Barcelona, is to protect the biosphere, with particular focus on
the conservation of biodiversity in all its manifestations.

“This means that we must do what is necessary to bring the issue of biodiversity
right into the centre stage of public awareness, media concern and decision-making
at the local, national and global levels,” Khosla told delegates at the closing
session.

Discussions at the congress revealed that there are indeed definite lessons to learn
from the debate about climate change. While many doubted the scientific basis of the
connection between climate change and human activity, it was the authoritative and
unambiguous view of the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reflecting
the combined scientific work of over 3,000 scientists that more or less put an end to
the debate. Clearly, IUCN is the body that can and must do what IPCC is doing with
climate change.

“The clear message coming out of this (Barcelona) meeting is that biodiversity underpins
the well-being of human societies and their economies,” said IUCN director-general Julia
Marton-Lefèvre. “But conservation can only succeed if we attack the underlying causes of
biodiversity loss, and action is taken at the same time to reduce the impacts of that loss.”

The IUCN programme for 2009-2012 on ‘Shaping a Sustainable Future’ says the IUCN
will contribute directly to targets agreed internationally by governments to reduce
the rate of loss of biodiversity.

It will also add an environmental perspective to the achievement of the Millennium
Development Goals (agreed in 2000 by 189 countries), the plan for implementation of
the World Summit on Sustainable Development (agreed in September 2002 in
Johannesburg) and other relevant international commitments.

Established in 1948 in Fontainebleau (Switzerland), three years after the United
Nations was founded, the IUCN with about 1,000 members from across the world,
including governments and international NGOs, is indeed poised to adjust itself to
the changed and fast-changing realities of the globalised world.

Not only does it face the most challenging environmental issues ever in history —
climate change and diminishing biodiversity — but IUCN members are also asking for
fundamental changes in its working.

It is against this backdrop that the election of Khosla is of vital significance. He
chairs the India-based Development Alternatives Group, a non-profit organisation
established in 1983 “for creating large-scale sustainable livelihoods. He is also
president of the Club of Rome, a global think-tank and centre of innovation and
initiative.

One of his top priorities is to set up a world commission in collaboration with WWF
and the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) to investigate the deeper implications of
‘green carbon’ such as sequestration, REED (a mechanism for compensating countries
for reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation) and biofuels.

The proposed commission would, like the World Commission on Dams, bring together
people from different walks of life and of different viewpoints who are in a
position to look at where the action on climate change and on biodiversity can take
place in the most meaningful way.

Another important point on IUCN’s agenda in the coming years is to “form new
partnerships among the best institutions to bring together their different insights
and to generate meaningful solutions that deal effectively with the inter-related
issues of population, natural resources, environment and development.”

The IUCN will also bring clarity into the basis for establishing appropriate relationships
with business. Judging from the debates on several motions on this subject at the Barcelona
congress, there would appear to be a considerable consensus that the IUCN must engage with
corporations, large, medium and small.

However, the terms of such engagement must be such as to lead to positive
conservation outcomes, and ensure that at no time is IUCN’s integrity or capacity to
fulfil its mission compromised in any way.

Marton-Lefèvre confirmed that perception. “My view has always been that IUCN was set
up to influence, encourage and assist society in dealing with nature and natural
resources in a most sustainable and socially equitable manner — and business is a
part of society, whether some of our members like it or not. So my feeling is
strongly that we must engage, but we don’t lose our voice in this engagement,” she
told IPS.

But Khosla went a step ahead, when he said in his closing remarks: “The national and
regional committees will have to be mandated to perform both expert and watchdog
roles at the grassroot levels.”

A task force to define the terms of such engagement and the changes in function
required is expected to be set up by the 32-member council that serves as the board
of directors of the organisation.

The congress did some important work to promote improvements in governance on the
high seas. As an area outside of national jurisdiction, these are often exploited by
all and managed by none.

The rights of vulnerable and indigenous communities received high priority at the
Barcelona congress as IUCN members called on governments to take into account human
rights implications in all conservation-related activities.

The congress saw the beginning of an ethical framework to guide
conservation activities where poverty reduction, rights-based approaches and ‘do no
harm’ principles can be applied to help redefine relating with nature.

With an eye on the UN climate change conference in Poland in December, the IUCN
called for more specific goals in line with the Bali Plan of Action — calling for a
50 to 85 percent reduction in CO2 emissions by 2050 and keeping a rise in
temperature below 2 degrees Centigrade.

Several high profile commitments were made during the congress to support the IUCN
mission: the MacArthur Foundation will invest 50 million dollars in climate change
mitigation and adaptation, and the Mohammed Bin Zayed Species Conservation Fund will
invest 25 million euros for worldwide biodiversity.

© 2008 Inter Press Service

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