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Sustainability

Tackle climate change and biodiversity loss together: UN panel

Tackle climate change and biodiversity loss together: UN panel

A one-year-old baby mountain gorilla eats leaves from a bush in the forest of Bwindi Impenetrable National Park in southwestern Uganda, Apr 3, 2021. (File photo: AP)

PARIS: The world must tackle the dual crises of climate change and biodiversity loss together, two United Nations expert groups meeting together said on Thursday (Jun 10), warning against measures to combat global warming that harm nature.

In the first ever collaboration between the UN's intergovernmental panels on climate and nature loss, the scientists said that while the twin threats were mutually reinforcing, they had historically been treated as if they were independent of each other.

A peer-reviewed workshop report, based on virtual discussions between experts from the IPBES biodiversity and IPCC climate panels, warned that a number of planned interventions against global heating would adversely impact nature.

EXPLAINER: What is the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change?

These include planting bioenergy crops over large land areas, which are detrimental to ecosystems.

They also cautioned against planting trees to suck up carbon pollution in ecosystems that have not historically been forested, which often damages biodiversity and food production.

The panel called for an end to the loss and degradation of carbon- and species-rich ecosystems on land and oceans.

Subsidies supporting activities harmful to nature - such as deforestation, over-fertilisation and over-fishing - must halt, the experts concluded.

READ: Government will 'proceed with care' when developing near areas of rich biodiversity: Desmond Lee

At the same time, they underlined the need for changes in individual consumption habits.

Restoring ecosystems was among the cheapest and quickest climate interventions available, and could also offer much-needed additional habitat for plants and animals, the researchers said.

Improved management of cropland and grazing systems alone could save 3 to 6 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent emissions a year.

"Climate change and biodiversity loss combine to threaten society - often magnifying and accelerating each other," said Hoesung Lee, chair of the IPCC.

Lee said that Thursday's report was an "important step" in the collaboration between scientific fields focusing on climate and those focused on biodiversity.

An aerial picture shows the area replanted with mangrove trees by Cukup Rudiyanto and his colleague Samsudin, in Pabeanilir village, Indramayu regency, West Java province,Indonesia, Mar 14, 2021. (Photo: Reuters/Willy Kurniawan

"LONG OVERDUE"

Alexandre Antonelli, director of science at Britain's Royal Botanic Gardens, said the IPCC and IPBES collaboration was "long overdue".

"Although climate change and biodiversity loss pose unseen threats to our future, the good news is that we can tackle both through the right measures - those that are based on solid science," said Antonelli, who was not involved in the report.

READ: Carbon dioxide in the air at highest level since measurements began

Several IPCC and IPBES members took the opportunity to stress the need for a total transformation in the way humans interact with nature.

Ana Maria Hernandez Salgar, chair of IPBES, said that nothing short of a "complementary" approach to both crises would avert the worst.

"Transformative change in all parts of society and our economy is needed to stabilise our climate, stop biodiversity loss and chart a path to the sustainable future we want," she said.

Environmental groups welcomed Thursday's collaboration, as well as the joint assessment's conclusion that nature alone cannot be relied upon to offset humanity's vast carbon emissions.

"The report unequivocally concludes that land- and ocean-based actions that capture carbon must be in addition to, and not in lieu of, ambitious reductions of emissions from fossil fuels," said Doreen Stabinsky, professor of global environmental politics at the College of the Atlantic.

Source: AFP/dv

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