27/09/2010
Department of Public Information / News
and Media Division
/ UN General Assembly
United Nations Secretary-General
Ban Ki-moon implored world leaders last
week to commit to reversing the alarming
rate of biodiversity loss and rescuing the
natural economy before it was too late.
Conserving the planet's
species and habitat was not only central
to sustainable development and the Millennium
Development Goals, it also had the potential
to generate annual economic gains worth
trillions of dollars, he said during the
opening of the General Assembly's high-level
meeting as a contribution to the International
Year of Biodiversity.
Allowing biodiversity
to decline was like throwing money out the
window, he continued. "We must stop
thinking of environmental protection as
a cost. It is an investment that goes hand
in hand with the other investments that
you, as Heads of State and Government, must
make to consolidate economic growth and
human well-being in your countries."
Warning that the 2010
deadline for substantially reducing the
rate of biodiversity loss would not be met,
Ban Ki-moon urged leaders to muster the
political will to turn that goal into reality,
as their legacy and "gift to generations
to come". He also called on them to
push forward the strategic plan on biodiversity
and the 2050 biodiversity vision expected
to be adopted at the Tenth Conference of
Parties to the Convention on Biological
Diversity, to be held in Nagoya, Japan,
next month.
He said that, together,
those initiatives would address such pressing
concerns as the need to set concrete national
targets before Rio+20, monitoring and evaluation
mechanisms, as well as access to and equitable
sharing of the benefits derived from genetic
resources. "It is a solid plan, on
paper. But it will need leadership to bring
it to life", he said, calling on ministers
of the environment, finance and planning,
economic production and transport, health
and social welfare, to do their part.
Echoing the Secretary-General's
concerns, General Assembly President Joseph
Deiss expressed hope that the discussions
would contribute to the negotiations in
Japan by ensuring that the strategic plan
and vision would be ambitious and feasible.
The Millennium target on environmental protection,
set out in the 2002 Johannesburg Plan of
Implementation, to stop biodiversity loss
had not been met, but it was heartening
that the international community was mobilizing
to address the threat and take steps to
assess the economic value of ecosystems.
He recalled that, last
June, the international community had agreed,
at an ad hoc intergovernmental and multistakeholder
meeting in Busan (Republic of Korea), to
create the Intergovernmental Science-Policy
Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services
(IPBES) with the aim of closing the information
gap separating scientists from policymakers
on the question of biodiversity and ecosystems.
He said preserving biodiversity
was inseparable from the fight against poverty
and the struggle to improve health and security
for the present and future generations.
"Preserving biodiversity is not a luxury,
it is a duty", he said, lamenting that
worldwide human activity and climate change
were destroying it, particularly in developing
countries, with dire consequences for the
world's poorest people.
+ More
Parties to the Cartagena
Protocol on Biosafety prepare to hold their
5th meeting
30/09/2010
Secretariat of the Convention on Biological
Diversity / United Nations Environment Programme
Parties to the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety
are preparing to hold their fifth ordinary
meeting from 11 to 15 October 2010 in Aichi-Nagoya,
Japan, at the Nagoya Congress Center (NCC).
More than 3,000 delegates representing governments,
civil society and industry are expected
to attend.
At their five-day meeting,
Parties are expected to adopt a Supplementary
Protocol on Liability and Redress to the
Cartagena Protocol, which will establish
international rules and procedures for liability
and redress in case of damage to biological
diversity resulting from living modified
organisms. It is also expected to adopt
a 10-year strategic plan for the Protocol
and a programme of work for the future meetings
of the Parties to the Protocol.
A number of other important
issues under the Protocol will also be discussed.
These include: risk assessment and risk
management of living modified organisms,
public awareness and participation, capacity-building,
the Biosafety Clearing-House, as well as
handling, transport, packaging and identification
of living modified organisms.
Cartagena Protocol
The Cartagena Protocol
on Biosafety is a supplementary agreement
to the Convention on Biological Diversity.
Its objective is to contribute to ensuring
the safe transfer, handling and use of living
modified organisms that may have adverse
effects on conservation and sustainable
use of biological diversity, taking also
into account risks to human health.
The Protocol was adopted
in Montreal on 29 January 2000 and entered
into force on 11 September 2003. To date,
159 States and the European Union have ratified
it.
The Protocol is named
after the Colombian city of Cartagena where
the final round of its negotiations was
launched.
