Brussels, 02/11/2010 (Agence Europe) - To everyone's relief, the tenth meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP 10, 18-29 October) to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity in Nagoya Japan managed, on Friday 29 October to reach an agreement on a global strategy to combat biodiversity loss over the next ten years.
The European Union was relieved and very pleased as it greatly feared talks would stall given how difficult it seemed it would be to reach an agreement on the funding of a strategic plan and on an ABS protocol (protocol on access to and benefit sharing) - two priorities that are dear to developing countries (see EUROPE 10245). The environment ministers of the 193 parties to the convention on biological diversity triumphed over these two difficulties. The Nagoya agreement concerns a strategic plan with 20 goals to be reached by 2020. Signatory parties undertook to carry out reform of subsidies that are detrimental for biodiversity by that date, and to avoid the over-exploitation of fishing resources, protect 17% of ground surface and 10% of marine and coastal areas (that are not currently under any form of protection), restore 15% of degraded ecosystems, and integrate the value of biodiversity into their national accounts.
“The European Union warmly welcomes the agreement here in Nagoya on a global strategy to combat biodiversity loss, the mobilisation of the necessary resources to implement it and the creation of a protocol on access to and benefit sharing of genetic resources. The world needs it and failure here was not an option”, Janez Potoènik, European Environment Commissioner, and Joke Schauvliege, Belgian Minster and President of the Environment Council, said immediately after the COP 10.
In their joint statement, they add: “The challenge now is to effectively implement the measures decided upon here in Nagoya. The EU will play its role to the full in this respect. We will of course continue to implement our own biodiversity strategy of halting the rate of biodiversity loss by 2020. And, of course, we will follow through on all of our obligations under the agreement reached here today. (…) Nagoya has been a major step forward. We hope that future generations will come to regard it as the 'tipping point' which brought our planet back from the brink of ecological disaster”.
The funding knot was unravelled once the developed countries undertook to state how much they would allocate to developing countries to safeguard biodiversity by 2012. Japan promised $2 billion over three years, the United Kingdom £100 million, and France €200 million (i.e. double its development aid for biodiversity).
The ABS protocol, which was finally concluded after eight years of negotiation, will ensure a more equitable sharing between rich and developing countries of resources generated by the use of plants from southern countries by northern countries for the production of medicines, pharmaceuticals and cosmetics. The taking of plants should be the subject of a prior agreement by the supplier country, and this go-ahead will be subject to the signing of an agreement on sharing the advantages generated by these plants.
Also, the road is now open for the forthcoming creation of an international platform of experts on biodiversity, after the fashion of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change). The United Nations has been entrusted with rapidly setting up this new body.
Environmental NGOs such as International Conservation welcomed the Nagoya agreement as historic, although they did regret that it provides no penalties in the event of failure to comply with commitments taken. (A.N./transl.jl)