Near the end of 2022, representatives from nearly every country on earth met in Montreal to negotiate a 30-year blueprint on how to save the world’s biodiversity. The conference, dubbed COP15, has been postponed for several years due to the COVID pandemic, but the delegation will continue to work on natural disasters, including the ambitious goal of better protecting an area that covers 30% of the world’s land. An agreement has been reached that promises a potential breakthrough for protection. Ocean. However, one key issue on which delegates at the conference did not agree was how to link efforts to protect biodiversity with efforts to address climate change.
From a policy perspective, it makes little sense to treat the problem of a warming planet and the loss of nature separately. We already know that species and ecosystems are endangered by rising temperatures. Many plants and animals face physiological stressors and migrate habitats or seek out other food sources when their surroundings become warmer or when they are hit by more extreme events. can lead to population decline and, in the worst case, extinction. Species that cannot migrate to escape climate change are particularly at risk. An obvious example is coral, which takes root while sea water warms the surroundings. Global economic damages of tens of billions of US dollars could occur as coral reefs continue to degrade, including the loss of important nutrient fish stocks.
At the same time, biodiversity loss affects the climate system. Ecosystems play major functional roles in the way carbon and water cycle between land, ocean and atmosphere. Degradation of these ecosystems also undermines the impact of climate regulation on local, regional and global temperatures. Amazon’s current state is a good example. Scientists fear that the loss of ecological resilience from deforestation, combined with rising temperatures, will prevent these rich forests from recovering and threaten to push the region into a state of permanent drought. increase. Several colleagues and I have published papers claiming that ecosystems are approaching such biodiversity and climate thresholds, but the urgent need to pay attention to the management of multifunctional landscapes , helps to avoid the worst risks.
If policymakers and diplomats do not see climate change and biodiversity as two sides of the same coin, they risk duplicating efforts to harness finite resources and funding. Siled efforts are counterproductive, such as sacrificing biodiversity for climate solutions, as happened when poorly planned renewable energy installations expanded into environmentally sensitive lands. There is also a possibility. Instead, we must tackle climate change and biodiversity loss together. This requires new ways of designing and implementing policies that treat environmental issues as interconnected. If we do not include an understanding of climate and biodiversity interactions in all our environmental and economic actions, we risk not only losing species and ecosystems, but exacerbating global warming.
It seems hard to believe that climate and biodiversity are still treated separately, given that images like the starving polar bear on melting ice floes have drawn attention to these links. But our policies still lag behind, so even a species as charismatic as the polar bear is ill-equipped to solve future problems far worse than losing a single species. yeah.
One objective lesson is that many wildlife diseases are driven by climate change, which can expand the range of vectors such as ticks and mosquitoes, and by pushing animals into small, concentrated areas where they may be particularly vulnerable. Deteriorating as a result of the compounding effects of habitat fragmentation. Be fashionable. Brainworm is one such disease. This parasitic nematode spreads through its host, the white-tailed deer. White-tailed deer are now expanding further north within the United States as temperatures rise. Blaine his worms are harmless to deer, but inflict excruciating deaths to moose. Declining elk populations are already impacting subsistence hunting among some Indigenous communities in the Great Lakes region. However, there is currently no comprehensive approach to addressing the spread of climate-driven disease in the United States.
Addressing such problems in an integrated way seems like a natural solution, but finding the best way has been difficult. Many countries have one ministry (often an energy or economic agency) that focuses on climate, and another ministry that deals with biodiversity. Both the Convention on Biological Diversity and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change are hosted by the United Nations, but the meetings are held separately, with different demands on participating countries and different approaches to common elements such as reporting and enforcement. We all know that these two institutions should be merged, but things always seem disjointed when you dig into the details.
At the COP15 meeting late last year, for example, a side agreement that would have expressed support for joint work on biodiversity and climate change collapsed after days of protracted debate. The document had been produced since his 2019 and emphasized the strong scientific basis for linking climate and biodiversity, but by the end of the conference, a concise decision to postpone the decision until 2024 stripped down to paragraphs. Do you want help kicking the can on the way?
Part of the story is the ongoing conflict between developed and developing countries over the costs of protecting ecosystems and reducing carbon emissions and who should bear the most responsibility. Unlike climates where wealthier countries produce the most greenhouse gas pollution, biodiversity is concentrated in developing countries and there is tremendous economic pressure to exploit these ecosystems. , as in climate change negotiations, poor countries want the Global North to cover the costs of protection and mitigation and share responsibility for biodiversity loss.
Another conflict concerned “nature-based solutions” as possible remedies. This label is increasingly given to measures that harness ecosystems to mitigate extreme events and sequester carbon. A 2017 study suggested that forest conservation and expansion, wetland restoration and peatland protection could provide more than a third of the carbon sequestration needed to stabilize temperatures by 2030. based solutions have expanded rapidly in recent years. The European Union strongly endorsed a firm statement on biodiversity and climate change at the Montreal conference, arguing for nature-based solutions as a panacea for many diseases. However, some developing countries see this concept as a possible Trojan horse that requires the Global South to bear the burden of protecting ecosystems while the Global North continues to pollute with fossil fuels. thinking about.
Countries and companies to urgently issue “net-zero” pledges to offset carbon emissions using afforestation and other ecosystem-based measures, rather than completely decarbonizing production and supply chains. There is some truth to these concerns, as evidenced by A shift away from fossil fuels. Developing countries are rightly worried that the price of this misguided approach will fall on their shoulders, even if they did little to cause the problem in the first place.
Sadly, this impasse poses even greater challenges for the future. The vision of expanding protected areas in the new Biodiversity Accord is applauded, but static, geographically limited protected areas are becoming increasingly vulnerable to climate impacts. Protected areas are not the only solution, as species migrating away from higher temperatures may no longer be within the boundaries originally set to protect them. These efforts need to be complemented with climate-specific additions, such as conservation corridors for migratory animals and legislative changes to manage species that allow them to migrate to higher elevations and cooler waters. .
Moreover, while policy failures to address climate and biodiversity endanger each, the consequences are of particular concern for biodiversity. While most policies aimed at conserving and restoring species and landscapes are climate-friendly, such as strengthening ecosystem protections that improve the resilience of nature and society to extreme events, climate policy and investment The same cannot be said for If they are not properly managed, they can have a negative impact on biodiversity. For example, using vast tracts of land to produce biofuels from corn and other crops to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels threatens natural habitats. Also, exploiting the deep seabed for minerals needed for new energy technologies such as electric vehicles can degrade the environment. of the marine ecosystem.
In light of these diplomatic and policy failures, a new vision is needed to address how climate change and biodiversity loss have irrevocably altered the composition of life on Earth. The way forward calls for the equivalent of biodiversity and climate ‘impact statements’ for all decisions: how policies, programs and management affect both issues and how How can a solution incorporate both elements? Our ultimate goal is to “live in harmony with nature” as called for by the Convention on Biological Diversity. Such a naturally positive future will ensure the healthy ecosystems needed to support both human and non-human life in a stable climate on our irreplaceable planet.
This is an opinion and analysis article and the views expressed by the author or authors are not necessarily Scientific American.
