I am just back to my
room after our Greenpeace coordination meeting
where we regrouped and set our plans for
the week to come- the final week of the
Convention on Biological Diversity. I have
been working with Greenpeace for almost
six years but the passion and energy of
our people never fail to amaze me.
Last week was tough.
Not merely physically - as most of us spend
an average of twelve hours each day in the
crammed rooms and corridors of the CBD venue
surviving on mass-produced sandwiches and
coffee - but primarily it was a tough week
for the spirit. It’s not easy to keep faith
when negotiators here argue over technicalities,
blocking progress and even taking steps
backwards instead of making progress to
save our oceans and forests and life on
earth.
A moment always comes
during meetings when you think to yourself:
“God, they will never move forward?!” It
is probably a collective feeling throughout
the meeting, one shared by NGOs and country
delegates who want to create agreements
to protect nature and not just keep legal
loopholes open for fishing, logging and
energy industries. Sometimes, though, things
start to move… you see that delegates are
working together, you see opinions change
and our team here getting the message across.
Governments here are meeting and negotiating,
offering concessions and saying that they
have bottom lines. One of the few constant
things at a UN meeting like this one is
change: side meetings, after-hours phone
calls, video conferences between people
here and their bosses back home all have
impact on what these countries do here at
the bargaining table.
Call me an optimist!
I really hope we are at that point of the
meeting. I’m one of the people keeping an
eye on the oceans-related discussions here
in Nagoya. This meeting is so important
for our oceans. Many diplomats will enter
the meeting room tomorrow morning with the
will to do the right thing – right now,
we’re in the middle of agreeing list of
environmentally important waters (or, ecologically
and biologically significant areas, if you
speak the CBD language) that would form
the beginnings of a network of marine reserves.
Me and my other oceans-defending colleagues
are pressuring these diplomats to form a
marine reserve network covers at least 20%
of our oceans by 2020. This will help us
reach the goal of protecting 40% of our
waters, which scientists tell us is what
we need to do if we’re going to leave behind
healthy oceans for the future.
We’re here to remind
delegates of the hundreds of millions of
people around the world who depend on our
oceans. The life in our oceans provide humankind
with food- and without healthy waters, the
world’s food supply will vanish. Healthy
oceans are not a luxury; they are indispensable
and they are priceless. We hear a lot here
about “financing biodiversity protection,”
but I remind people that this isn’t about
financing, it’s about investing in our future
and keeping our planet and its people alive.
Who can put a price on our planet’s ability
to feed us?
Listening to my fellow
Greenpeacers at the meeting I realized once
more that we only get more willful and creative
when things get difficult. I wish the same
to our countries’ representatives, so I’m
telling all of them- you represent the people
of 193 countries and you are here to decide
on a plan to protect all of us, all life
on earth. Monday would be a good day to
start creating our future. If not now, when?
+ More
The importance of Indonesia
I was hoping to write
my first post in Indonesia from the Rainbow
Warrior. As it turns out, the Warrior is
anchored out at sea, waiting for permission
to get into the country from the Indonesian
government. The ship and crew have been
there for several days now, occasionally
communicating with Indonesian supporters
by virtual hookup (at this event for disappointed
supporters) instead of in the steel flesh
everyone was hoping see.
I on the other hand
am very much here, in the middle of Jakarta,
on the most densely populated island on
Earth (Java). What can I tell you about
Jakarta? It smells of cloves. The congested
traffic crawls. The people are interesting,
enthusiastic, gracious. It's humid – really
humid. Every day, a downpour or two washes
away the smog and cools the city down; you
can almost hear the pavements sizzle.
To be honest, I haven't
seen much of the city; I've mostly been
in the Greenpeace office here, planning
for the ship tour, then planning for a shipless
ship tour.
Even so, I've picked
up a little knowledge about Indonesia from
my colleagues here. For starters, it's home
to the world’s only lungless frog, the world's
largest lizard, and the world's most expensive
coffee - made from civet poo (honestly).
I don't have the space here to tell you
about the tree-climbing fish.
A lot of things about
Indonesia seem to be “the world's only”
or “the world's largest” or “the world's
most”. For instance:
The Indonesian archipelago
is the world's largest. It's home to more
endemic bird species than any other country
(and more endemic mammal species than any
other country but one) on Earth. It has
one of the highest levels of biodiversity
world wide - on about only 1.3 percent of
the Earth’s land surface. (Alfred Russel
Wallace's theories on evolution and natural
selection – the theories that prompted Darwin
to publish On the Origin of Species - were
largely based on his work in Indonesia.)
It's also the world’s
largest producer of palm oil, and a significant
producer of paper and pulp used for glossy
magazines, toilet paper and packaging globally.
Most of this production happens by destroying
rainforests and peatlands (which are perhaps
the world’s most critical carbon stores).
As a result, Indonesia
is the world's third largest emitter of
greenhouse gases, and many of its species
– the ones that Wallace studied – are losing
their territories and even habitats terrifyingly
quickly. Some – the Sumatra tiger and the
orang-utan, for instance – are at risk of
extinction. That's not to mention the tens
of millions of Indonesian people who depend
on these disappearing forests for their
livelihoods, including indigenous communities
who rely on the forests for everything:
food, shelter, medicine and identity.
But there's good news.
Greenpeace Indonesia is the fastest growing
office in the Greenpeace world, and they're
leading a campaign for what could be the
world's first deal to comprehensively protect
a country's critical rainforests and carbon-rich
peatlands. It's all up to Norway's and Indonesia's
leaders. If they manage to get this agreement
right, they will succeed in protecting Indonesia's
forests and go a long way to protecting
the world's climate. They will also be setting
a precedent for similar deals in the future.
