Cop15, the UN conference on biodiversity, enters the tough negotiations this Thursday with the arrival of ministers from different countries. They will tackle the most sensitive points of the discussions to try to establish common objectives with a view to curbing the destruction of life on Earth by 2030. At the heart of the tensions, the question of funding.
In the absence of Heads of State or Government, more than a hundred Ministers of the Environment meet from this Thursday until Saturday, to conclude these negotiations which aim to stop the destruction of the planet. and its resources. Members of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) must endorse a “global biodiversity framework”. It includes some twenty objectives, including the protection of 30% of land and seathe halving of pesticides and the restoration of millions of hectares of degraded soils, etc.
To finance these objectives, a multilateral fund dedicated to biodiversity is needed. This is what the African states in particular are demanding from the most developed countries, reports our special correspondent in Montreal, Lucile Gimberg. ” Existing resources are not enough, according to the Senegalese Ousseynou Kassé, who chairs the Africa group in the negotiations. And you also need a technology transfer mechanism “.
One hundred billion dollars per year until 2030, even specified Brazil a few days ago. Because creating new protected areas for animals, plants and ecosystems, and above all transforming agricultural systems, will be expensive. In particular in the countries of the South where the population is very dependent on natural resources. One hundred billion dollars per year, or 1% of global GDP by 2030, or about ten times the current aid amounts. And as much as those promised for the fight against global warming.
But before paying, we want pledges, retorts the Norwegian Minister of the Environment, Espen Eide. ” To give money, you have to know what it will be used for. This means having the assurance that the objectives will be ambitious and that there will be national verification mechanisms. »
And the European Union insists: public development aid cannot be the only solution, the private sector and each State must put money on the table.
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