Leaders around the world promise more measures to protect the planet

A major group of international leaders pledged on Monday to take more urgent action to protect the planet, in response to the rapid loss of biodiversity and the effects of the climate crisis.

The initiative, announced at a forum parallel to the UN General Assembly, includes pledges to reduce pollution of all kinds, end the disposal of plastics in the oceans, prosecute environmental crimes more harshly or take more ambitious steps within the framework of the Paris Climate Agreement.

In total, leaders from more than 60 countries, representing 1.4 billion people and a quarter of the world’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP), sealed the commitment on Monday.

Signatories include major economic powers such as the United Kingdom, Germany, France and the European Union as a whole, countries with threatened ecosystems and important oil industries such as Canada and Norway or Asian nations with large populations such as Pakistan and Bangladesh.

The promise was also endorsed by Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez and numerous Latin American leaders, including the presidents of Bolivia, Colombia, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay and Peru.

Among the absences are those of the United States and China – the two great economic powers and the largest emitters of greenhouse gases – that of a country like Brazil, considered key to the protection of biodiversity, and that of other giants such as Russia and India.

PLANETARY EMERGENCY

“We are in a state of planetary emergency: the interdependent crises of biodiversity loss and ecosystem degradation and climate change – largely created by unsustainable production and consumption – require urgent and immediate global actions,” says the text presented on Monday.

Faced with this situation, the leaders commit to a ten-point plan that has as its central objective to place nature and biodiversity on the road to recovery by 2030.

In it, they assure that their recovery plans from the pandemic and the economic crisis it has generated will have “biodiversity, climate and the environment” as key elements, with a “green” and “fair” response.

According to a report published this month by the UN, humanity only has a few years to prevent the sixth mass extinction of species that the planet has suffered in its history, this time caused by the action of man.

The study showed that only seven of the 60 biodiversity protection criteria established internationally in 2010 have been completed.

BIODIVERSITY PACT

The UN plans to convene its Biodiversity Conference in China next year, with the aim of developing a great global pact, in the style of the Paris Agreement on climate and this week will try to give impetus to that idea with a virtual summit in which the participation of dozens of international leaders is expected.

The leaders who participated in Monday’s meeting, however, wanted to get ahead of themselves to make clear from the outset their ambition and give their support to the idea of protecting 30% of the planet by 2030, a proposal launched last year by a group of countries led by Costa Rica and France.

“We must act right now. We cannot afford to hesitate or delay because the loss of biodiversity is happening today and is happening at a frightening rate,” British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said during the virtual event in which the initiative was launched and where he announced that his country will expand several protected areas.

The Minister of Ecological Transition of Spain, Teresa Ribera, pointed out in a video message that the country is a “hot spot” in terms of biodiversity, both for its wealth and its vulnerability, and expressed the commitment to have 30% of its land and marine surface protected by 2030.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau insisted on the need to convince more countries – especially the largest ones – to join this goal, lamenting that Canada is the only state among the ten largest by territory that participates in the initiative.

Source: EFE Green