New Vision Required to Stave Off Dramatic Biodiversity Loss
Nairobi, Kenya -Natural systems that support economies, lives and livelihoods
across the planet are at risk of rapid degradation and collapse
unless there is swift, radical and creative action to conserve and
sustainably use the variety of life on Earth.
This is one principal conclusion of a major
new assessment of the current state of biodiversity and the
implications of its continued loss for human well-being.
The third edition of Global Biodiversity
Outlook (GBO-3), produced by the Convention on Biological
Diversity (CBD), confirms that the world has failed to meet its
target to achieve a significant reduction in the rate of
biodiversity loss by 2010.
The report is based on scientific
assessments, national reports submitted by governments and a study
on future scenarios for biodiversity. Subject to an extensive
independent scientific review process, the publication of GBO-3 is
one of the principal milestones of the UN’s International Year of
Biodiversity.
The Outlook will be a key input
into discussions by world leaders and Heads of State at a special
high level segment of the United Nations General Assembly on 22
September. Its conclusions will also be central to the negotiations
by world governments at the Nagoya Biodiversity Summit in
October.
The Outlook warns that massive
further loss of biodiversity is becoming increasingly likely, and
with it, a severe reduction of many essential services to human
societies as several “tipping points” are approached, in which
ecosystems shift to alternative, less productive states from which
it may be difficult or impossible to recover.
Potential tipping points analyzed for GBO-3
include:
- The dieback of large areas of the Amazon forest, due to the
interactions of climate change, deforestation and fires, with
consequences for the global climate, regional rainfall and
widespread species extinctions. - The shift of many freshwater lakes and other inland water
bodies to eutrophic or algae-dominated states, caused by the
buildup of nutrients and leading to widespread fish kills and loss
of recreational amenities. - Multiple collapses of coral reef ecosystems, due to a
combination of ocean acidification, warmer water leading to
bleaching, overfishing and nutrient pollution; and threatening the
livelihoods of hundreds of millions of species directly dependent
on coral reef resources.
The Outlook argues, however, that
such outcomes are avoidable if effective and coordinated action is
taken to reduce the multiple pressures being imposed on
biodiversity. For example, urgent action is needed to reduce
land-based pollution and destructive fishing practices that weaken
coral reefs, and make them more vulnerable to the impacts of
climate change and ocean acidification.
“Humanity has fabricated the illusion that somehow
we can get by without biodiversity or that it is somehow peripheral
to our contemporary world: the truth is we need it more than ever
on a planet of six billion heading to over nine billion people by
2050.” Achim Steiner UN Under-Secretary-General and Executive
Director of the United Nations Environment Programme.
The document notes that the linked
challenges of biodiversity loss and climate change must be
addressed by policymakers with equal priority and in close
co-ordination, if the most severe impacts of each are to be
avoided.
Conserving biodiversity and the ecosystems
it underpins can help to store more carbon, reducing further
build-up of greenhouse gases; and people will be better able to
adapt to unavoidable climate change if ecosystems are made more
resilient with the easing of other pressures.
The Outlook outlines a possible new
strategy for reducing biodiversity loss, learning the lessons from
the failure to meet the 2010 target. It includes addressing the
underlying causes or indirect drivers of biodiversity loss, such as
patterns of consumption, the impacts of increased trade and
demographic change. Ending harmful subsidies would also be an
important step.
Click here for the
class=”SectionItemText”>Full News Release
Click here for the
target=”_blank”>Executive Summary of the Full Report
Source: www.unep.org
