Governments fail to deliver on biological diversity

In 2002, parties of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) – which included most nations on the planet agreed on a target to stem the loss of biodiversity by 2010. There are still more than six months to go before that deadline officially expires – but nationally, regionally and globally, the results are not good news.

A study recently published in Science revealed that on virtually all levels, governments have failed miserably in stopping the reduction of species, species populations and habitats.

The CBD have now released the third edition of its Global Biodiversity Outlook which reports on the latest data and provides the foundation for the CBD’s future strategy.

The summary makes for grim reading.

It seems that putting a figure on the value of marine biodiversity and what the economic damage would be if it continues to be depleted, is the only way to get politicians and fisheries managers to accept how critical the issues are.

According to Dr Achim Steiner from the UN’s Environment Programme :

"Humanity has fabricated the illusion that somehow we can get by without biodiversity or that it is somehow peripheral to our contemporary world: the truth is we need it more than ever on a planet of six billion heading to over nine billion people by 2050."

As Dr Steiner points out, the mission to protect the wealth of biodiversity cannot be conducted purely for its own sake, but to ensure that the planet is able to support us.

That’s why ensuring the regeneration of the marine environment, rather than the ‘sustainable exploitation’ of it, is so important.

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