H.E.Yasmine Fouad, Minister of Environment, Egypt • Inger Andersen, Executive Director, UNEP
Simon Stiell Executive Secretary, UNFCCC
Elizabeth Mrema, Executive Secretary, Convention on Biological Diversity
It is a pleasure to co-convene this thematic day on biodiversity with Egypt – who, we mustn’t forget, carried the presidency for the Convention on Biological Diversity COP14, which started the process of developing the post-2020 global biodiversity framework.
My thanks to Minister Fouad for raising the profile of biodiversity at this climate COP and for focusing on the need for the three Rio Conventions – on climate, biodiversity, and land degradation – to work together.
It is essential for biodiversity to receive clear focus in climate processes. Because climate change is one of the main, and growing, threats to biodiversity – alongside changing land- and sea-use, over exploitation of species, pollution, and invasive species.
And we cannot separate out the three prongs of the triple planetary crisis: the crisis of climate change, the crisis of nature and biodiversity loss, and the crisis of pollution and waste.
The triple crisis is the worst kind of three-for-one offer, served up to us by unsustainable consumption and production. Unsustainable food systems. Financial systems that subsidize and sustain greenhouse gas emissions and unsustainable land use practices. But nature and biodiversity solutions are often also climate and pollution solutions, and vice-versa. These are the kind of three-for-one offers we want.
We know that nature and biodiversity, through Nature-based solutions, holds the key to one third of the mitigation required to meet the ambition of Paris Agreement. It holds the key to helping vulnerable nations and communities to adapt to climate impacts – because nature, for millennia, protected people from weather extremes. Until we started destroying it.
And that’s what this thematic day is all about. Urgency of action, at scale, to address the biodiversity and climate crises together, for people and planet.
Friends, we have a plethora of international commitments, pledges and ambitions, including the Paris Agreement and – we all expect – a strong and concrete global biodiversity framework, to be delivered next month at the CBD COP.
But words – whether spoken or written – do not change a thing, except in fantasy novels and films. We are not magicians. We are ordinary people, who must turn words into action through hard work in parliaments, boardrooms and in cities and fields across the globe.
This Biodiversity Day will recognize those who have done so. It will highlight stories of success across scales where local communities, countries, regions and the global community have acted decisively on the climate and biodiversity agenda. These stories will show us what has been done. What can be done. But, again, they won’t do it for us.
This Biodiversity Day must advance action on valuing, conserving, restoring and sustainably using biodiversity to slow and adapt to climate change. We must look to the future, with clarity and vision. Think hard on the importance of policy coherence and of innovation. On the importance of finance and strengthened institutions. On the importance of action across all scales and by all actors.
Biodiversity Day will be an active dialogue. We are bringing together Ministers, leaders from civil society, the private sector and Indigenous communities. After each of the main pillars of our sessions today, we will hear from the youth. They will, I am sure, hold us to account, on our commitments and our delivery.
Biodiversity Day will be a success if each of us takes away strengthened resolve. A new idea or tool. A new plan. But when you leave this room today, remember that we have achieved nothing concrete by talking. Our achievements will be measured by the follow-up actions we take: this week, next week and every week of the years ahead. Our achievements will be measured by, and judged upon, the health of biodiversity and the climate.
Friends, We cannot afford to delay. The sands of time always run faster than we think. How many of us look back and wonder, where has the year has gone? Where has the decade gone? Where have our lives gone? Let us not look back in 2030, or 2050, and find ourselves asking where biodiversity has gone. Rather, let us commit here in Sharm el Sheikh, the place where we met for CBD COP14, that we will come together, settle long-standing issues, especially concerning finance, so that at COP 15 we lean in towards the centre, understanding the critical need for equity and the differences amongst countries so that COP15 in Montreal will be a success.
