KUNMING - MONTREAL AGREEMENT - ENVIRONMENT
News: Historic
biodiversity deal gets the nod at COP15 summit in Canada
What's in the news?
● Negotiators
reached a historic deal at a U.N. biodiversity conference early December 19
that would represent the most significant effort to protect the world’s lands
and oceans and provide critical financing to save biodiversity in the
developing world.
● The
global framework comes on the day the United Nations Biodiversity Conference,
or COP15 is set to end in Montreal.
● China, which holds the
presidency at this conference, released a new draft
on December 19 that gave the sometimes contentious talks much-needed momentum.
30-by-30:
● Delegates
committed to protecting 30% of land and
30% of coastal and marine areas by 2030, fulfilling the deal’s highest-profile
goal, known as 30-by-30.
● Indigenous
and traditional territories will also count toward this goal, as many countries
and campaigners pushed for during the talks.
● The
world will strive to prevent destroying
intact landscapes and areas with a lot of species, bringing those losses “close
to zero by 2030”.
Money for nature:
● Signatories
aim to ensure $200 billion per year
is channeled to conservation initiatives, from public and private sources.
● Wealthier countries
should contribute at least $20 billion of this every year by 2025, and at least
$30 billion a year by 2030.
Big companies report impacts on biodiversity:
● Companies
should analyze and report how their operations affect and are affected by
biodiversity issues.
● The
parties agreed to large companies and financial institutions being subject to
“requirements” to make disclosures regarding their operations, supply chains
and portfolios.
● This
reporting is intended to progressively
promote biodiversity, reduce the risks posed to business by the natural world,
and encourage sustainable production.
Harmful subsidies:
● Countries
committed to identify subsidies that deplete
biodiversity by 2025, and then eliminate, phase out or reform them.
● They
agreed to slash those incentives by at
least $500 billion a year by 2030, and increase incentives that are
positive for conservation.
Pollution and pesticides:
● Reducing
the overall risk from pesticides and highly hazardous chemicals by at least half by 2030.
● Focus
on other forms of pesticide management.
Monitoring and reporting progress:
● All
the agreed aims will be supported by processes to monitor progress in the
future, in a bid to prevent this agreement meeting the same fate as similar
targets that were agreed in Aichi, Japan, in 2010, and never met.
Overall,
the Kunming-Montreal agreement will
focus on reducing the negative impacts of pollution to levels that are not considered
harmful to nature, but the text provides no quantifiable target here.
National action plans will be set and reviewed, following a similar format used
for greenhouse gas emissions under U.N.-led efforts to curb climate change.