UN meeting on saving species opens in Japan

Malcolm Foster, Associated Press Yahoo News 18 Oct 10;

TOKYO – Delegates from more than 190 nations kicked off a U.N. conference Monday aimed at ensuring the survival of diverse species and ecosystems threatened by pollution, exploitation and habitat encroachment.

But the two-week marathon talks of the U.N. Convention on Biological Diversity face some of the same divisions between rich and poor nations over what actions to take that have bogged down global climate negotiations.

Scientists warn that unless we start doing more to protect species, extinctions will spike and the intricately interconnected natural world will be damaged with devastating consequences.

"We're on the verge of a major extinction spasm," said Russ Mittermeier, president of Conservation International and a field biologist who has spent decades studying primates. "Healthy ecosystems are the underpinnings of human development."

If one part of the complex network of living organisms disappears — like bees, which perform the critical role of pollination and whose numbers are falling — the whole system can collapse, scientists argue.

Bringing together 15,000 participants in Nagoya, 170 miles (270 kilometers) west of Tokyo, for the convention's 10th meeting since it was born at the Earth Summit in 1992, the conference will try to hammer out a set 20 measurable targets for the next decade to try to slow or halt these trends.

"The time to act is now and the place to act is here," Ahmed Djoghlaf, executive secretary of the convention, said in a statement.

One of the most attention-getting proposals is to set aside vast tracts of land and ocean as protected areas, although developing nations don't want this to undercut their prospects for economic development.

Another contentious issue will be trying to create a legal structure to equitably share access and benefits from genetic resources, such as plants that have medicinal value — long a sore point among developing countries.

For example, the rosy periwinkle, a plant native to Madagascar, produces two cancer-fighting substances. Western drug companies have grown the plants and profited from them, but little of the money has returned to Madagascar. Developing countries argue they should receive a share of the benefits.

The biodiversity convention doesn't have a particularly good track record. It has failed to reach global goals set in 2002 to make improvements in protecting biodiversity by this year.

Scientists estimate that the Earth is losing species 100 to 1,000 times the historical average. They warn that's pushing the Earth toward its sixth big extinction phase, the greatest since the dinosaurs were wiped out 65 million years ago.

Mittermeier said that in his field, of the 669 different kinds of primates, 49 percent are threatened, largely because of habitat destruction and hunting.

"That's indicative of a real extinction risk," he said.

In one of the 20 proposed goals for 2020, delegates will seek to agree on a percentage of land and ocean to be designated protected areas, which can range from a strict nature reserve to an area managed for sustainable use of natural resources.

The draft text of the final agreement calls for the land percentage to be raised to 15 or 20 percent, up from about 13 percent now. But no specific target has surfaced for oceans, of which less than 1 percent are currently protected.

But even if governments agree on a global figure, implementing the plan is bound to encounter plenty of hurdles, including businesses who don't want to give up access to resources.

Some 193 governments have joined the biodiversity convention. Only three have not ratified it: the United States, Andorra and the Holy See.

Host country Japan, meanwhile, will be looking to this conference as a chance to portray itself as a protector of biodiversity after helping kill off many of the measures at the CITES, or Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, meeting earlier this year that would have limited the trade in tuna, sharks and other marine species. Tokyo has also come under harsh criticism by environmental groups for its whaling program.

"It's a chance for the Japanese government to show that Japan can play a leadership role in marine and biodiversity issues," said Wakao Hanaoka, an ocean campaigner for Greenpeace.

UN calls for immediate action to save life on Earth
Kyoko Hasegawa Yahoo News 18 Oct 10;

TOKYO (AFP) – The world must act immediately to stop the rapid loss of animal and plant species that allow humans to exist, the United Nations warned on Monday at the start of a major summit on biodiversity.

Delegates from the 193 members of the UN's Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) are gathering in the central city of Nagoya to try to work out strategies to reverse a man-made mass extinction.

"The time to act is now and the place to act is here," CBD executive secretary Ahmed Djoghlaf said as the meeting opened, describing the 12-day event as a "defining moment" in the history of mankind.

"Business as usual is no more an option when it comes to life on Earth... we need a new approach, we need to reconnect with nature and live in harmony with nature."

Delegates were told human population pressures were wiping out ecosystems such as tropical forests and coral reefs, killing off animal and plant species that form the web of life on which humanity depends.

"This meeting is part of the world's efforts to address a very simple fact. We are destroying life on Earth," the UN Environment Programme's executive director Achim Steiner said in a speech at the opening ceremony.

"We are destroying the very foundations that sustain life on this planet."

Delegates in Nagoya plan to set a new target for 2020 for curbing species loss, and will discuss boosting medium-term financial help for poor countries to help them protect their wildlife and habitats.

But similar pledges to stem biodiversity loss have not been fulfilled, and Djoghlaf said governments around the world had to acknowledge that failure.

"Let's have the courage to look into the eyes of our children and admit that we have failed individually and collectively to... to substantially reduce the rate of loss of biodiversity by 2010," Djoghlaf said.

"Let us look into the eyes of our children and admit that we continue to lose biodiversity at unprecedented rates."

At the start of the decade, UN members pledged under the Millennium Development Goals to achieve "a significant reduction" in the rate of wildlife loss by 2010, the International Year of Biodiversity.

Instead, habitat destruction has continued unabated, and some experts now warn that the planet faces its sixth mass extinction phase -- the latest since dinosaurs vanished 65 million years ago.

Nearly a quarter of mammals, one third of amphibians, more than one in eight birds, and more than a fifth of plant species now face the threat of extinction, said the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

In May, a UN report warned of looming "tipping points" that could irreversibly damage ecosystems such as the Amazon rainforest, through logging and land clearance, and coral reefs through global warming and overfishing.

The Earth's 6.8 billion humans are effectively living 50 percent beyond the planet's biocapacity in 2007, according to a new assessment by WWF that said by 2030 humans will effectively need the capacity of two Earths.

Meanwhile, disputes between rich and poor nations that have plagued efforts to curb greenhouse gases threaten to similarly hamper biodiversity negotiations.

The European Union is calling for a target of halting biodiversity loss by 2020, while many developing nations only support a weaker goal of "taking action" on the issue.

There are also tensions over efforts to forge an accord on the "equitable sharing" of the benefits from natural resources -- for example a medicine derived from a jungle plant -- under a so-called Access and Benefits Sharing Protocol (ABS).

Under a proposal backed by developing nations, companies would pay a "gene fee" if scientists find plants or animals that have been used by indigenous groups and have commercial use such as in the pharmaceutical industry.

Brazilian Environment Minister Izabella Teixeira warned this month that "for us, it is not acceptable to go to Nagoya and not have an agreement for (the) ABS Protocol... We need a deal."

Some developing countries have warned that a plan to set up an international scientific panel to assess biodiversity issues and advise policy makers could be blocked if there is no deal on the ABS protocol.

World Needs Urgent Action To Stop Species Loss: U.N
Chisa Fujioka PlanetArk 19 Oct 10;

The world cannot afford to allow nature's riches to disappear, the United Nations said on Monday at the start of a major meeting to combat losses in animal and plant species that underpin livelihoods and economies.

The United Nations says the world is facing the worst extinction rate since the dinosaurs vanished 65 million years ago, a crisis that needs to be addressed by governments, businesses and communities.

The two-week meeting aims to prompt nations and businesses to take sweeping steps to protect and restore ecosystems such as forests, rivers, coral reefs and the oceans that are vital for an ever-growing human population.

These provide basic services such as clean air, water, food and medicines that many take for granted, the United Nations says, and need to be properly valued and managed by governments and corporations to reverse the damage caused by economic growth.

More resilient ecosystems could also reduce climate change impacts, such more extreme droughts and floods, as well as help fight poverty, the world body says.

"This meeting is part of the world's efforts to address a very simple fact -- we are destroying life on earth," Achim Steiner, head of the U.N. Environment Programme, said at the opening of the meeting in Nagoya, central Japan.

Delegates from nearly 200 countries are being asked to agree new 2020 targets after governments largely failed to meet a 2010 target of achieving a significant reduction in biological diversity losses.

A U.N.-backed study this month said global environmental damage caused by human activity in 2008 totaled $6.6 trillion, equivalent to 11 percent of global gross domestic product.

Greens said the meeting needed to agree on an urgent rescue plan for nature.

LIFE-SUPPORT

"What the world most wants from Nagoya are the agreements that will stop the continuing dramatic loss in the world's living wealth and the continuing erosion of our life-support systems," said Jim Leape, WWF International director-general.

WWF and Greenpeace called for nations to set aside large areas of linked land and ocean reserves.

"If our planet is to sustain life on earth in the future and be rescued from the brink of environmental destruction, we need action by governments to protect our oceans and forests and to halt biodiversity loss," said Nathalie Rey, Greenpeace International oceans policy adviser.

Developing nations say more funding is needed from developed countries to share the effort in saving nature. Much of the world's remaining biological diversity is in developing nations such as Brazil, Indonesia and in central Africa.

"Especially for countries with their economies in transition, we need to be sure where the (financial) resources are," Eng. B.T. Baya, director-general of Tanzania's National Environment Management Council, told Reuters.

"It's not helping us if you set a lot of strategic targets and there is no ability or resources to implement them."

Poorer nations want funding to protect species and ecosystems to be ramped up 100-fold from about $3 billion now.

Delegates, to be joined by environment ministers at the end of next week, will also try to set rules on how and when companies and researchers can use genes from plants or animals that originate in countries mainly in the developing world.

Developing nations want a fairer deal in sharing the wealth of their ecosystems, such as medicines created by big pharmaceutical firms, and back the draft treaty, or "access and benefit-sharing" (ABS) protocol.

For poorer nations, the protocol could unlock billions of dollars but some drug makers are wary of extra costs squeezing investment for research while complicating procedures such as applications for patents.

Conservation groups say failure to agree the ABS pact could derail the talks in Nagoya, including agreement on the 2020 target which would also set goals to protect fish stocks and phase out incentives harmful to biodiversity.

Japan, chair of the meeting, said agreement on an ambitious and practical 2020 target was key.

"We are nearing a tipping point, or the point of no return for biodiversity loss," Japanese Environment Minister Ryu Matsumoto told the meeting.

"Unless proactive steps are taken for biodiversity, there is a risk that we will surpass that point in the next 10 years."

(Editing by David Fogarty)

'Ten years' to solve nature crisis, UN meeting hears
Richard Black BBC News 19 Oct 10;

The UN biodiversity convention meeting has opened with warnings that the ongoing loss of nature is hurting human societies as well as the natural world.

The two-week gathering aims to set new targets for conserving life on Earth.

Japan's Environment Minister Ryo Matsumoto said biodiversity loss would become irreversible unless curbed soon.

Much hope is being pinned on economic analyses showing the loss of species and ecosystems is costing the global economy trillions of dollars each year.

Ahmed Djoghlaf, executive secretary of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), described the meeting in Nagoya, Japan, as a "defining moment" in the history of mankind.

"[Buddhist scholar] Daisetsu Teitaro Suzuki said 'the problem of nature is the problem of human life'. Today, unfortunately, human life is a problem for nature," he told delegates in his opening speech.

Referring to the target set at the UN World Summit in 2002, he said:

"Let's have the courage to look in the eyes of our children and admit that we have failed, individually and collectively, to fulfil the Johannesburg promise made by 110 heads of state to substantially reduce the rate of loss of biodiversity by 2010.

"Let us look in the eyes of our children and admit that we continue to lose biodiversity at an unprecedented rate, thus mortgaging their future."

Earlier this year, the UN published a major assessment - the Global Biodiversity Outlook - indicating that virtually all trends spanning the state of the natural world were heading downwards, despite conservation successes in some regions.

It showed that loss and degradation of forests, coral reefs, rivers and other elements of the natural world was having an impact on living standards in some parts of the world - an obvious example being the extent to which loss of coral affects fish stocks.

In his opening speech, Mr Matsumoto suggested impacts could be much broader in future.

"All life on Earth exists thanks to the benefits from biodiversity in the forms of fertile soil, clear water and clean air," he said.

"We are now close to a 'tipping point' - that is, we are about to reach a threshold beyond which biodiversity loss will become irreversible, and may cross that threshold in the next 10 years if we do not make proactive efforts for conserving biodiversity."

Climate clouds

In recent years, climate change has dominated the agenda of environmental politics.

And Achim Steiner, executive director of the UN Environment Programme, suggested there is a lack of understanding at political levels of why tackling biodiversity is just important.

"This is the only planet in this Universe that is known to have this kind of life," he said.

"This fact alone should give us food for thought, But more importantly, we are destroying the very foundations that sustain life on this planet; and yet when we meet in these intergovernmental fora, society somehow struggles to understand and appreciate what it is what we're trying to do here, and why it matters."

On the table in Nagoya is a comprehensive draft agreement that would tackle the underlying causes of biodiversity loss, as well as setting new targets for conservation.

At the heart of the idea is the belief that if governments understand the financial costs of losing nature, they can adopt new economic models that reward conservation and penalise degradation.

A UN-sponsored project called The Economics of Ecosytems and Biodiversity (TEEB) calculates the cost at $2-5 trillion per year, predominantly in poorer parts of the world.

Jane Smart, head of the species programme at the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), said that although the problem was huge and complex, there were some encouraging signs.

"The good news is that when we carry out conservation, it does work; we increasingly know what to do, and when we do it, it works really really well," she told BBC News.

"So we need to do a lot more conservation work, such as protected areas - particularly in the sea, in the marine realm - we need to save vast areas of ocean to protect fish stocks - not to stop eating fish, but to eat fish in a sustainable way."

Triple win

Governments first agreed back in 1992, at the Rio Earth Summit that the ongoing loss of biodiversity needed attention. The CBD was born there, alongside the UN climate convention.

It aims to preserve the diversity of life on Earth, facilitate the sustainable use of plants and animals, and allow fair and equitable exploitation of natural genetic resources.

The UN hopes that a protocol on the final element - known as access and benefit sharing (ABS) - can be secured here, 18 years after it was agreed in principle.

However, the bitter politicking that has soured the atmosphere in a number of UN environment processes - most notably at the Copenhagen climate summit - looms over the Nagoya meeting.

Some developing nations are insisting that the ABS protocol be signed off before they will agree to the establishment of an international scientific panel to assess biodiversity issues.

The Intergovernental science-policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) is due to be signed off during the current UN General Assembly session in New York.

Many experts - and Western governments - believe it is necessary if scientific evidence on the importance of biodiversity loss is to be transmitted effectively to policymakers.

See also Nagoya 2010: UNEP chief addresses opening of Biodiversity summit on the UNEP website.