Biodiversity, Our Greatest Ally

By Jose Luis Gallego, environmental communicator (@ecogallego)
 

Along with climate change, biodiversity loss is the most serious dilemma mankind is facing today. In fact, these crises are one and the same, because they feed each other and are closely intertwined. For this reason, we must address them together and with equally urgent commitment.

If we acknowledge the need for climate action to avoid the most alarming scenarios – those where extreme weather events grow increasingly frequent and violent – we should also agree that taking appropriate measures to safeguard and restore natural spaces is necessary to halt the accelerating loss of species currently underway on our planet.  

According to the recent Living Planet Report (2024) issued by the prestigious conservation organization WWF, almost three-quarters of all vertebrate populations are in decline at this time. The data collected for this meticulous report reveals that between 1970 and 2020, the populations of the more than 5,000 monitored species of mammals, birds, fish, and amphibians have experienced an alarming decline of 73%.  

In terms of insects, we have lost a quarter of all species in just one century. The data for marine biodiversity is even more worrisome, because we don’t know much about the oceans, and the little we do know is very alarming. For instance, as the report indicates, if we fail to maintain global warming below 1.5ºC, we will lose between 70% and 90% of the world’s coral reefs, including the Great Barrier Reef, the largest living organism to have ever existed on Earth.  

When we talk about species extinction, we are not only referring to the disappearance of the animals and plants who live with us, but also to the services they provide – what scientists refer to as “ecosystemic services”.

These include basic services, such as those that provide us with the air we breathe, the water we drink or the crops that feed us. This is why halting biodiversity loss is such an urgent matter: it really comes down to a question of survival. And this is why it is so necessary and in our own interest to invest in safeguarding biodiversity. Investing in biodiversity is actually a great economic opportunity.

To this end, the UN incentivized the creation of the Global Biodiversity Framework Fund: a kind of common fund built on international co-operation and aimed at covering the investments needed to halt biodiversity loss. According to experts, the fund needs to raise at least 200 billion US dollars per year to cover everything that is needed. However, before establishing a specific amount, there is a question that needs to be asked: who should provide all of this money?

The answer points to different financing sources, from green bonds – the market trend at the moment – to paying for ecosystemic services; from economic compensation for biodiversity loss to conservation credits and other mechanisms to share in the profits derived from nature. This brings up yet another question, namely what profits are we talking about here?

Addressing this question led, in 2010, to the Nagoya Protocol, an international agreement that regulates access to resources extracted from nature, assigns value to said resources, and gives local communities the right to a fair and equitable share of the profits derived from their use. 

The following example illustrates the aim of this initiative: when a pharmaceutical or chemical company or a cosmetics brand use the properties of a plant, animal or any other living thing to produce a drug, chemical substance or cosmetic product, they have to budget for the protection, conservation, and stewardship of the ecosystem where said organism lives. But it goes further than that.

The Nagoya Protocol also stipulates that if the company exploits this natural resource commercially, the local community that shares the habitat of the species in question and has used it sustainably, thereby supporting its existence throughout history, has the right to receive part of the profits generated by the resulting product.

If this proposed international agreement were signed into law, much of the financing needed to protect nature and halt biodiversity loss, as well as safeguard the rights of indigenous people, would proceed from the companies making a profit off of these natural resources. 

The UN Secretary-General himself, António Guterres, recently stated that biodiversity has “underpinned scientific discoveries and economic growth” and said the time has come to settle the bill with nature. And invest in our collective future.