Big victory: Financing plan for species protection presented at the biodiversity summit

Big victory: Financing plan for species protection presented at the biodiversity summit

Two years ago after more than 190 countries at a summit of the United Nations A historical promise to protect the biodiversity of the world, the question arose whether they could adhere to this promise. At the recent meeting in Cali, Colombia, which has been taking place in the past two weeks, the focus was on disputes about the financing needs of nature conservation, without a significant solution.

However, there were also positive aspects. A success was that the negotiators approved a contract that enables large companies to use digital Genetic information from nature to pay, if profit is created. For example, a highly profitable agricultural company in the United Kingdom could use a digital DNA sequence of a plant found in Brazil to improve a harvest. According to the contract, this company is encouraged to pay 1 % of its profits or 0.1 % of its sales into a fund that could help countries like Brazil to pay for nature conservation.

The contract seemed far from the summit this year. Civil society groups and researchers refer to him as a decisive victory in view of the Rapid decline in global biodiversity .

"It is a voluntary mechanism, so it remains to be seen how we can get it up and make sure that companies will be active," says Yadvinder Malhi, an ecosystem researcher at the University of Oxford, UK. "However, it is a great success and we have to build on it."

threatened species

The research results published during the Cali summit, the 16th conference of the contracting parties on biological diversity (COP16), underlined the urgent need for measures to protect biodiversity.

The International Union for Nature Conservation, based in Gland, Switzerland, that more than a third of the tree species is threatened with extinction worldwide . The nature conservation organization WWF, also from Gland, also reported that the average size of animal populations on earth in the past 50 years has decreased by 73 % .

"We are already at a turning point, and the changes in these ecosystems will be irreversible," says Manuel Pulgar-Vidal, global director for climate and energy at WWF.

Nevertheless, many researchers were frustrated about the feeling of standstill at COP16. At the end of the summit, only 44 of the over 190 countries who signed the agreement to protect biodiversity two years ago submitted action plans. Although around $ 163 million in Cali for protection and restoration of nature have been promised, this amount is far from the 200 billion USD required per year, which are necessary to achieve the goal of protecting 30 % of the land and sea areas by 2030.

Since the countries do not yet provide the necessary funds, the pressure is growing to seek private financing.

pay for knowledge

As part of the Agreement on Payment for Genetic Information from Nature, also known as digital sequence information (DSI), highly profitable companies are asked to contribute to the nature conservation fund "Cali Fund". In order to be able to access the funds, these companies have to meet two out of three criteria: they have to have over 20 million USD to assets per year, generate $ 50 million a year or achieve an average of 5 million profit per year over the past three years.

"Classic nature conservation is mainly financed by governments and foundations," explains Amber Hartman Scholz, head of the Department of Science and Politics at the Leibniz Institute DSMZ in Braunschweig, Germany. "Now companies that benefit from biodiversity are asked to pay."

If the countries create strong legal framework to ensure company compliance, economic models show that the DSI agreement could bring in between USD 1 and 9 billion per year, adds Scholz.

"It's a step in the right direction," says Nathalie Seddon, evolutionary ecologist at the University of Oxford. She is concerned that the Agreement does not oblige companies to pay in the funds, and instead leaves the governments to ensure compliance. However, it indicates a positive aspect: Half of the Cali Fund was reserved for indigenous peoples and local communities, which are often the keepers of area -rich, biodive areas. (The negotiators on COP16 also agreed to found a subsidiary body for indigenous communities in order to represent their interests in future decisions in the field of nature conservation.)

The price of biodiversity

On the discussions on another opportunity to persuade companies to support nature protection, there were many controversy: The sale of biodiversity certificates .

The idea is that companies can acquire biodiversity certificates to improve their image, to ensure their survival when they rely on natural -based products, and to compensate for any damage they add to the types of earth in their companies. These certificates would then be used globally for nature conservation projects.

During the COP16, the International Advice Board for Biodiversity Certificates (IAPB) - a group of 25 specialists from the fields of economy, nature conservation and finance worldwide - its guidelines for the establishment and expansion of the program. However, this publication met with criticism.

The plan was with Carbon certificates compared that companies can acquire to compensate for their greenhouse gas emissions. Carbon certificates were made because of their potential connections to Human rights violations and the generation of winnings for intermediate traders who sell the certificates With simultaneous non-compliance with emission reductions , criticized.

"Government investments are the only thing that provides significant sums of money for nature conservation, and these efforts are reduced by the sale of biodiversity certificates, which are complex, unmoved and not in demand," says Brian O’Donnell, director of the environmental organization Campaign for Nature based in Durango, Colorado.

according to a Report of the World Economic Forum from December 2023 How to gain carbon certificates of tensile force, the global demand by 2030 reach $ 2 billion and

Simon Zadek, member of the IAPB and managing director of NatureFinance - a non -profit organization in Geneva that wants to increase the role of finance in nature conservation - argues that the "shame" of the voluntary carbon markets offers teaching that enable a functioning market for biodiversity certificate.

This is how the committee recommends that there should be no secondary trading in the market for biodiversity certificates, as is practiced by intermediate dealers in the carbon market. Instead, the committee proposes a national model in which the company that damage nature is taxed by its government. The income would be used for the acquisition of national biodiversity certificates to finance 20 to 25 years of nature restoration programs.

If the IAPB does not drive the creation of a market for biodiversity certificates, there is "a real risk" that private companies, including those who are already working in the carbon market, will act without supervision, warns Zadek. This would lead to a "mess".