The stalemate is dragging on as attempts to formally discuss a precautionary suspension of mining activities have been thwarted by nations in favour of exploiting the ocean’s mineral resources.

Over a dozen countries spearheaded by Chile, Costa Rica and France want to officially debate for the first time in history the possibility to halt deep-sea mining until its full impact on the ocean’s biodiversity is understood.

Hervè Berville, the French Minister for Marine Affairs, told the Assembly on Wednesday that the world “must not and cannot embark on a new industrial activity without measuring the consequences and taking the risk of irreversible damage”.

For the past decade, the mining industry has proposed to extract minerals from the deep seabed that can later be used to make batteries for electric vehicles.

However, the potential impacts of mining the ocean floor are largely unknown, putting biodiversity at risk. More than 750 marine scientists signed an open letter calling for a ban on the practice until robust scientific evidence can back it up.

High Seas Treaty exempts deep-sea mining from stricter environmental rules

Mining industry pushback

China and the island-state of Nauru have so far blocked the motion for a moratorium discussion, preventing agreement over the agenda. Both countries sponsor companies pushing for the exploitation of seabed minerals. Mexico also initially opposed but then retracted.

Gina Guillén, head of the Costa Rican delegation and one of the leaders of the coalition calling for a pause on mining, said one sole country was fiercely blocking the agenda item, even after offering a lighter discussion than expected.

“Just one country is opposing (the agenda item on the discussion). We hope it does happen. One country can’t hijack the most important body of the (ISA) just for being a big economy. That goes against all principles of multilateralism,” Guillén said.

‘We are not ready’: Divisions deepen over rush to finalise deep sea mining rules

Calls for a so-called moratorium have been gathering pace during the annual meeting of the ISA, the little-known UN body tasked with regulating the vast ocean floor in international waters.

This year’s week-long summit, set to end on Friday, comes at a pivotal time. Any member state could theoretically apply for a full-blown mining contract on behalf of a company, after a deadline triggered by Nauru lapsed earlier in July.

So far the ISA has only handed out ‘exploration’ permits which do not allow commercial exploitation of the minerals.

Mining code delayed

But several operators have already been exploring an area of the Pacific Ocean floor known as the Clarion Clipperton Zone. The region is rich in polymetallic nodules containing nickel, cobalt, copper and manganese, which are critical for manufacturing electric vehicles.

Among the most active is Canada-based start-up The Metals Company, whose license is sponsored by Nauru. After the island nation triggered an obscure provision two years ago, the ISA accelerated the pace of its negotiations to establish mining rules before a July 9th, 2023.

The Metals Company, and its partner Nauru, hoped to begin industrial-scale mining as early as 2024, following the expected approval of a mining code.

But their ambitions were cut back last week after the ISA delayed timeline for the regulations. The 36 members of the body’s council gave until 2025 to adopt the mining code.

It is now a question of when — rather than if — commercial scale nodule collection will begin. https://t.co/oWI8AOZPBR

— gerard barron (@gtbgtb) July 24, 2023

Blow to industry

Nauru’s president Russ Joseph Kun expressed disappointment on Wednesday that the ISA did not complete the process within the two-year deadline.

Member states in fact could still apply for a mining licence despite the rules not being in place. This would push the body into uncharted territory without clear guidelines on how such a request would be examined.

The Metals Company said it reserves the right to submit an application in the absence of a mining code. “It is now a question of when — rather than if — commercial-scale nodule collection will begin”, its CEO Gerard Barron said in a statement.

But the listed company’s stock tumbled by over 20% this week, hinting at investors’ diminishing confidence in its mining prospects.

Guillén from Costa Rica said approving the new 2025 deadline was “critical”. “They wanted a 2024 deadline, but we said no way,” she said.

Moratorium discussion

Campaigners opposed to deep-sea mining viewed the new 2025 deadline for the mining code with optimism but repeated their pleas for a moratorium, which would block any attempt to start commercial operations.

“This unprecedented agenda fight comes as a coalition of nations from Latin America, the Pacific and Europe try and wrangle the debate away from serving narrow corporate interests towards the public good”, said Louisa Casson from Greenpeace, who is attending the talks in Jamaica.

If the agenda is approved, it would mark the first time countries hold a formal discussion on suspending deep sea mining, although this discussion would not necessarily lead to a moratorium.

Still, Gillén said this is an important precedent, and said “we cannot destroy the seabed by taking a rushed decision”.

Last year, countries agreed to a treaty for the high seas, which creates international marine protected areas. However, this milestone could be undermined if deep sea talks end up with a bad deal, the Costa Rican negotiator added.

“Even after having agreed to the (high seas) treaty, if we don’t have strong safeguards for the seabed in those same areas, then we won’t have achieved anything,” Guillén said.

The post UN deep-sea mining talks deadlocked over agenda clash appeared first on Climate Home News.

That is one of the proposals by the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) for a global framework to protect the Earth’s plant and wildlife.

The draft text published by the CBD on Monday outlines a 10-year strategy to halt the decline and extinction of species and allow ecosystems to recover by 2050.

Governments are due to adopt a new set of biodiversity targets during talks in Kunming, China, in October to replace the 2020 goals agreed in Aichi, Japan, in 2010 – most of which have been missed. The draft text will form the basis for negotiations this year.

Under the Aichi goals, governments agreed to prevent the extinction of know threatened species by 2020 and to improve their conservation status.

But a major report by the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (Ipbes) in May last year warned species extinction was accelerating with ecosystems deteriorating at rates unprecedented in human history.

The report found one million animal and plant species are now threatened with extinction, with climate change identified as the third biggest driver after changes in land and sea use and the direct exploitation of organisms.

How can the biodiversity and climate crises be tackled together?

The Kunming meeting will be a key moment for the world to define a global strategy for protecting biodiversity. Governments are under pressure to make the summit what the 2015 climate talks in Paris were for global climate action.

Monday’s draft text presents a number of targets in brackets, which will be discussed and likely altered by governments.

One of the proposed goals is for protected areas and other conservation measures to cover “at least [30%] of land and sea areas with at least [10%] under strict protection” by 2030.

“That sounds like a lot of slippery language,” Alex Rogers, professor of conservation biology at Oxford University, told Climate Home News. “We need at least 30% of the ocean covered by ‘strict’ protection. 10% just isn’t going to do it.”

“The CBD has to deal with two major crises – the climate change crisis and the species crisis,” he added.

Brian O’Donnell, director of Campaign for Nature which has backed calls for 30% of the planet to be protected by 2030, agreed the draft was “a good start” but that the language needed to be clarified.

“To only ‘strictly protect’ 10% of the planet’s lands and seas raises flags as to what protection means for the remaining 20% and whether or not those protections are sufficient to safeguard lands, waters, and wildlife,” he said.

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A number of governments have already come out in support of protecting 30% of the world’s land and oceans by 2030. A UK initiate, backed by 10 small and European countries, is calling for at least 30% of the oceans to be protected by 2030.

Carlos Manuel Rodriguez, minister for energy and the environment of Costa Rica, one of the signatories to the initiative, said the draft was “a starting place to have meaningful discussion”.

While the draft proposed quantifiable and tangible goals, how these targets are implemented remains unclear.

The draft notes that “governments and societies need to determine priorities and allocate financial and other resources” in order to restore ecosystems. But the draft makes no mention of financial targets to achieve the goals.

“The mechanisms that ensure that we deliver on those targets are not there yet,” Li Shuo, from Greenpeace China, told CHN. “We know where we want to go but we don’t know how to get there.”

Some of the proposed implementation mechanisms include eliminating subsidies that are most harmful for biodiversity, integrating biodiversity values into national and local planning and promoting  knowledge sharing including innovation and traditional indigenous practices.

2019 second warmest year on record, ends hottest decade yet, says EU observatory

Without substantial and measurable mechanisms to implement the targets, Li warned the Kunming biodiversity framework could be a repeat of the Aichi targets, leading to “not much commitment on the rules to deliver these targets.”

The Aichi goals called for at least 17% of land and 10% of coastal and marine areas to be protected.

A 2018 report by UN Environment (UNEP) and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) found 15% of land was protected but not all key biodiversity areas benefited from conservation measures.

Meanwhile, progress has been in marine areas with 7% to 8% of the oceans now under some form of protection, Rogers told CHN. But almost all protected areas lie in national coastal waters, with less than 1% in the high seas beyond national jurisdictions which includes nearly two-thirds of the world’s oceans, according to the UNEP-IUCN report.

“That needs to change,” Rogers said.

The draft text will be reviewed at a working group meeting in Kunming at the end of February, when a mandate for a second draft could be agreed.

The post UN outlines 2030 goals to save planet’s biodiversity appeared first on Climate Home News.

Great apes offer a yardstick against which we can measure the destruction of the natural world, a leading ape conservationist has warned.

Douglas Cress from the Great Ape Survival Partnership at the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) told RTCC that by taking apes away from their natural environment, we are causing those ecosystems to “implode”.

“It is clear that by saving the great apes, we are saving ourselves,” he said. “They are great indicators of the world we live in and the world that we are creating for ourselves.

“We have learnt over the years that if you take a large species, like a gorilla, or an elephant or a rhino out of a forest or out of an ecosystem, it all begins to crumble. You can’t take them out at the scale you are doing now without forests imploding on themselves.

“But when you put them back you find that forests actually recover quite quickly.”

There are four species of great ape around the world. Chimpanzees, gorillas, and bonobos which are found in equatorial Africa and orangutans found in South East Asia.

But human settlements, logging, mining, disease, deforestation and illegal trade are putting these species under threat.

Some reports predict certain species of ape could be extinct within a generation.

There are currently around 20,000 humans for every chimpanzee on the planet, and Cress warns that humans and apes are in direct competition.

“It turns out the great apes need exactly the same things as we do to survive; the same areas, the same habitats, the same temperatures, the same food,” he said. “We are in direct competition now with great apes. There is probably little doubt that we will win but we also have the grace and the intelligence not to push them off the planet, I think.”

Orangutans, for example, live on only two Indonesian islands – Sumatra and Borneo – and with the growing trend to convert forest into oil palm plantations, the number of these apes are down to just 55,000 in the wild.

In Africa, human encroachment, the extraction of timber and mining are putting other ape species under threat. In Nigeria, there are only 300 endangered Cross River gorillas living in the wild.

The illegal trade of apes is also a huge problem. Cress warns that hundreds of apes are being transported from Africa to Asia – mainly China and Vietnam – each year for pets.

Cress warned that we need to halt these destructive practices to ensure the survival of what he believes is such a vital creature.

“Humans do not have to continue the same destructive practices for centuries if it spells their doom – that is the definition of insanity, if you hope for a different result,” he said. “We can be smart enough to provide alternative livelihoods, sustainability models, provide different forms of nutrition. We can do a million things that aren’t as simple or as base as destroying habitats and killing great apes.”

The post UNEP: Great apes offer yardstick for environmental destruction appeared first on Climate Home News.

Photographer: Sami Sarkis
Location: Lebanon — Beirut
Publication: Rio Conventions Calendar

Rapid urbanization in relatively high-risk areas is a special concern because it concentrates people and assets, increasing vulnerability to impacts of climate change.

According to the latest United Nations projections, the world’s total population will rise substantially and is expected to reach 9 billion by the middle of the century.

More than half of these people live in urban centres, and practically all live in settlements depending on industry, services, and infrastructures for jobs, well-being and mobility.

Risk-prone settlements such as coastal areas are expected to experience not only increases in weather-related disasters but also major increases in population, urban areas and economic activity, especially in developing countries.

Growing population and wealth in exposed or vulnerable coastal locations could result in increased environmental, economic and social damage.

Large-scale adaptation in cities and the integration of adaptation strategies into national and international development strategies is urgently required.

Biodiversity resources constitute an essential input for up to 40% of the world’s economy, and while only 2% of the world’s surface is urbanized, decisions made in cities define the consumption of up to 75% of natural resources.

The growing role played by local authorities in allocating resources, promoting and attracting sustainable investments and technology, managing consumption and defining land-use planning makes them critical partners to achieve sustainable development.

Around the world, leading cities are showing that urbanization does not necessarily lead to environmental degradation: cities can be part of the solution.

The Rio Conventions Calendar is published annually by Entico in partnership with the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD).

The post Photo of the week #23 – The world’s expanding cities appeared first on Climate Home News.

The aim is to demonstrate how Sustainable Development is becoming a reality on every continent, country and city.

Here, Braulio Ferreira de Souza Dias, Executive Secretary of the Convention on Biological Diversity explains why managing biodiversity is a way for business to manage risk.

Managing diversity is a way for businesses to manage risk, says UNCBD

Business is one of the key stakeholders in the global mission to preserve biodiversity.

As for all of us, businesses depend upon biodiversity and ecosystem services to survive.  The products and services provided by the natural environment are the basis for stable, predictable and profitable activities.

Unfortunately, current business practices are, for the most part, one of the main contributors to the serious loss of biodiversity.

This needs to change.

However conserving biodiversity is not merely a question of saving the environment.It is also an important business opportunity.

Consumers are becoming much more aware of biodiversity issues, and as a consequence they are increasingly looking for sustainable products and services.

Business, therefore, faces an increasing level of scrutiny for its impact on biodiversity. With this added scrutiny, comes an increased risk of tougher regulations and a more unforgiving marketplace.

Businesses are also increasingly held responsible for the supply chains through which their products and services are produced.

That encompass the actions of farmers, fishers and a host of other producers whose activities can have an enormous impact on biodiversity. Thus businesses must not only look at their own processes, but at all aspects of the lifecycles of their products and services.

As a result of this, it can be seen that managing biodiversity is, for businesses, a way of managing risk.

Research shows that biodiversity loss can lead to higher costs for inputs to business processes, or unpredictable changes in the way in which a business operates.

Consumers are increasingly looking for sustainable products and services

Ignoring biodiversity can therefore result in loss of profit and market share, and cause severe disruption to existing business models.

Businesses, being a prime driver of biodiversity loss and a major economic force in most economies, will play a key role in determining whether countries meet their 2020 targets.

If businesses resist change and continue their destructive practices, they will act as a severe impediment to the political adoption of meaningful targets.

Conversely, if businesses are “on board” they can act as a positive force and partner with regards to biodiversity conservation and can help to move the political agenda forwards in a meaningful and constructive fashion.

I want to call upon business everywhere to work together to preserve live on earth, and in so doing, work to build successful and sustainable business models for the 21^st century and beyond.

Braulio Ferreira de Souza Dias is Executive Secretary of the Convention on Biological Diversity (UNCBD).

This article is part of a series commissioned by the Rio Conventions for their RioPlus Business project.

The post Rio+20 Business Focus: Managing biodiversity is managing risk for business, says CBD appeared first on Climate Home News.

The world must drastically curb population growth to be in with a chance of holding back an irreversible global ‘tipping point’ warn scientists on the eve of the Rio+20 Earth Summit.

The global population hit seven billion in late 2011 and current predictions put it hitting nine billion by the middle of the century.

The report, published in Nature, warns that an accelerating loss of biodiversity and destruction of ecosystems, rapid population growth and resource use and climate change could be driving the Earth towards an irreversible, planet-wide tipping point that would have destructive consequences.

The researchers warn we are on the path to an irreversible tipping point for the planet (© NASA)

The authors predict this tipping point could be reached within the century, and warn that once reached it could mean the collapse of the planet’s ecosystems as we know them in the blink of an eye.

They use examples of previous shifts, for example the end of the last ice age 12,000 years ago when the world went from being glaciers to its current state within just 1,000 years.

“That’s like going from a baby to an adult state in less than a year,” said Arne Mooers, one of the report authors. “Importantly, the planet is changing even faster now.”

Unsustainable Pathway

The researchers concerns are echoed by the UN Environment Programme whose latest report warns that the world “continues to speed down” an unsustainable path.

The fifth edition of the Global Environment Outlook (GEO-5) launched ahead of Rio+20 found that in spite of a number of international agreements to protect the planet only four out of 90 of the most important environmental goals had seen significant progress.

UNEP have urged for drastic action and big-scale measures to be adopted to reverse this pattern.

“If current trends continue, if current patterns of production and consumption of natural resources prevail and cannot be reversed and ‘decoupled,’ then governments will preside over unprecedented levels of damage and degradation,” said Achim Steiner, Executive Director of the UNEP.

7% from destruction

The authors of the Nature report examined studies of small scale ecosystems to show that once 50-90% of an area has been altered the entire ecosystem tips into a state far different from the original.

While they say no one knows how close the Earth is to a global tipping point, many of the warning signs are there, and they conclude that the world should keep as far away from the 50% mark of transformation of the Earth’s surface to avoid collapse.

With the conversion of landscapes to agriculture and urban usage, we’ve already reached the 43% mark on surface transformation.

The report warns that with the quadrupling of the human population in a century and with more pressure placed on fossil fuels we are already seeing changes such as species extinctions and dead zones in our oceans.

The report concludes that the world must drastically lower population growth and resource use (© James Cridland/Creative Commons)

“In a nutshell, humans have not done anything really important to stave off the worst because the social structures for doing something just aren’t there,” says Mooers. “My colleagues who study climate-induced changes through the earth’s history are more than pretty worried. In fact, some are terrified.”

Solutions

On the eve of the Rio+20 Earth Summit the report authors set out five clear actions which must be taken immediately to delay or minimise the planetary shift.

Urgent action should be taken to reduce the world population and to reduce per-capita resource use, according to the reports conclusions. Fossil Fuels should be replaced by sustainable sources and a more efficient food production and distribution system should be developed which does not take over any more land.

Finally the authors urge for areas of the Earth which has not already been taken over by human populations to be better managed – both on land and at sea – and protected as reservoirs for biodiversity and ecosystems.

“My view is that humanity is at a crossroads now, where we have to make an active choice,” said report co-author Anthony Barnosky. “One choice is to acknowledge these issues and potential consequences and try to guide the future. The other choice is just to throw up our hands and say, ‘Let’s just go on as usual and see what happens.’

“My guess is, if we take that latter choice, yes, humanity is going to survive, but we are doing to see some affects that will seriously degrade the quality of life for our children and our grandchildren.”

The post Scientists urge population rethink ahead of Rio+20 appeared first on Climate Home News.

Loss of biodiversity could impact ecosystems as much as climate change, pollution and other environmental stresses, according to new research.

The study, published in Nature, aims to directly compare the impacts of biological diversity loss, with those of other human-caused environmental changes including climate change.

And the results, according to the researchers, highlight the need for stronger local, national and international efforts to protect biodiversity.

Analysis: How can the biodiversity and climate crises be tackled together?

The researchers say the biggest challenge will be predicting the impacts of multiple environmental challenges (© Axel-D/Creative Commons)

The research – which combined data from 192 peer-reviewed studies to compare how environment factors affect plant growth and decomposition of dead plants – found that where local species falls within a lower range of projections (1 to 20% loss of species) there will be little impact on plant growth.

In this case changes in species will rank low compared to other impacts such as climate change.

Where species fall within intermediate projections (21-40%) however, species loss could reduce plant growth by 5-10%.

This change, according to the researchers, will be comparable to those witnessed with increasing ultraviolet radiation and a warming climate.

And where higher levels of extinction (41-60%) were predicted, the impacts of species loss ranked alongside other changes including ozone pollution, acid deposition on forests and nutrient pollution.

The researchers warned this loss of biodiversity could reduce nature’s ability to provide goods and services, including food, clean water and a stable climate.

They said the biggest challenge for researchers now would be to predict the impacts of these combined challenges of biodiversity loss, climate change and pollution on our natural environments.

See the full report here.

The post Biodiversity loss impacts ecosystems as much as climate change appeared first on Climate Home News.

Photographer: Britta Jaschinski
Publication: Rio Conventions Calendar

Biodiversity loss disrupts ecosystem functions, making ecosystems more vulnerable to shocks and disturbances, less resilient, and less able to supply humans with needed services.

The damage to coastal communities from floods and storms, for example, can increase dramatically where protective coastal wetland and forest habitats have been lost or degraded.

Conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity is therefore an important component in adaptation to extreme weather events associated with climate change.

The Rio Conventions Calendar is published annually by Entico in partnership with the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD).

The post Photo of the week #16 – protecting biodiversity appeared first on Climate Home News.

Forests and woodlands are an important part of our landscape and provide many benefits to society.

The tree species that are native to England have adapted to the local climate, atmosphere and soils over many years.

However, human activities have resulted in changes to the natural environment, especially over the past 200 years.

It is expected that the climate of England will become milder and wetter in winter, and significantly hotter and drier in the summer months over the coming century.

These changes to our climate are predicted to be larger and more rapid than any since the last ice-age, posing real problems for trees, woodland and forestry.

The Rio Conventions Calendar is published annually by Entico in partnership with the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD).

The post Photo of the week #10 appeared first on Climate Home News.

Climate change induced glacier retreat could impact the ecosystems of river relying on the water run off (Vironevaeh/creative commons)

Climate change and glacier retreat could impact biodiversity of river systems, according to new research.

The study, published in Nature Climate Change examined the biodiversity loss of glacier-fed river systems across the Ecuador Andes, the Swiss and Italian Alps and the Coastal Range Mountains in southeast Alaska.

The researchers found evidence in all regions that several aquatic macroinvertebrates – those large enough to be seen without a microscope – began to disappear in regions where a high disappearance of glacial coverage in the river’s catchment was witnessed.

Between 8 to 14 species could be lost completely with the complete disappearance of glaciers in the region, according to the scientists.

As many of the glacier-fed river systems represent isolated islands of biodiversity, the researchers warned that not only local and regional extinctions are possible, but also the extinction of endemic species.

The study warned that extinction would be undesirable as the macroinvertebrates play a key role in ecosystem functioning – for example organic matter decomposition.

It also warned that the role of these species in the food chain in such ecosystem was still unknown and the impact their disappearance could have on fish, amphibians, birds and mammals still unpredictable.

The post Climate change could lead to loss of biodiversity in glacier-fed rivers appeared first on Climate Home News.