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Multilateral Fund for Biodiversity

Posted on June 24, 2022 by admin1  563

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Recently, the Global Environment Facility (GEF) has promised to provide $5.33 billion over the next four years to address problems related to biodiversity worldwide.

Why is it Needed?

  • Less funding: 
    • Earlier, a group of countries including Argentina and Brazil and Gabon, called for developed countries to provide at least $100 billion a year, rising to $700 billion per year by 2030.
  • Missed Targets 
  • The world failed to meet the Aichi targets on biodiversity set for 2011-2020, due to lack of adequate financial resources. In 2020, an assessment showed that none of the 20 Aichi targets had been met.
  • Environmental crisis: 
    • There have been recent developments where people from Tanzania’s Maasai community are being forcefully evicted from their ancestral land to make way for a luxury game reserve for the rich.

Key Highlights

  • It was announced at an information session of the ongoing preparatory meeting on the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework meeting in Nairobi.
  • The Nairobi meet is being held in preparation for the 15th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CoP15), scheduled in the last quarter of 2022 in Montreal, Canada.
  • Funding: 
    • The amount is 30 percent more than the last four years. Biodiversity would be the focus area during these years and at least 60 percent of the commitments will be related to biodiversity.
    • The plan is to provide $1 million per country for in-country work and $9 million as global technical assistance.
  • GEF is providing the funds to:
    • Improve food systems, 
    • Ecosystem restoration, 
    • Ensuring clean and healthy oceans, 
    • Climate change mitigation and 
    • Managing chemicals and waste, among other things. 

Global Environment Facility (GEF)

  • Established on the eve of the 1992 Rio Earth Summit.
  • The only multilateral fund focused on biodiversity.
  • The GEF is a unique partnership of 18 agencies — including United Nations agencies, multilateral development banks, national entities and international NGOs — working with 183 countries to address the world’s most challenging environmental issues. 
  • Finance:
    • Financial contributions by donor countries are provided via several trust funds administered by the World Bank acting as the GEF Trustee and serviced by a functionally independent Secretariat housed at the World Bank.
    • The GEF Trust Fund was established to help tackle our planet’s most pressing environmental problems. 
    • GEF funding is provided by participating donor countries and made available to developing countries and countries with economies in transition to meet the objectives of international environmental conventions and agreements.
  • The GEF is a financial mechanism for five major international environmental conventions: 
    • the Minamata Convention on Mercury, 
    • the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs), 
    • the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity (UNCBD), 
    • the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) and 
    • the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

Significance

  • Multi-faceted Investment: Investing in the environment is important considering that money spent now can help avoid massive future costs that come from the degradation of nature as well as zoonotic diseases and pandemics that can be caused due to the loss of nature.
  • Reversing the Loss: Such initiatives will compel the countries to reverse the biodiversity losses and invest more on saving the environment.

Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework / Kunming Declaration

  • The Kunming Declaration was adopted by over 100 countries on October 13, 2021, at the first part of the ongoing virtual 15th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity. 
  • It calls upon the parties to “mainstream” biodiversity protection in decision-making and recognises the importance of conservation in protecting human health.
  • The theme of this declaration is “Ecological Civilization: Building a Shared Future for All Life on Earth”.
  • By adopting this, the nations have committed themselves to support the development, adoption and implementation of an effective post-2020 implementation plan, capacity building action plan for the Cartagena Protocol on biosafety.
  • Kunming Declaration acknowledges that the aim of the post-2020 global biodiversity framework should be to reverse biodiversity loss by 2030. 
  • The adoption of the declaration will create momentum for a new global biodiversity pact.
  • This declaration is a reflection of the political will of all parties to the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity.
  • The conference is organised every two years but due to the pandemic, the meeting was delayed and the members have not got together in four years. 

Conclusion 

  • Enhancing the Fund: The fund provided is much less than the requirement estimated by Campaign for Nature, a non-profit. At least one percent of global gross domestic product is needed each year to deal with the biodiversity crisis.
  • Local Community Participation: Developed countries have to provide funds in the form of grants and not debt and also ensure that indigenous people and local communities had direct access to these resources.
  • Eliminating Subsidies: There is also a need to eliminate subsidies that are harmful to nature. These include subsidies on fishing or promotion of fossil fuels.

Source: DTE

 
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