World Nature Summit agrees on nature conservation agreement – experts doubt it will be successful
Created: 12/19/2022, 5:35 p.m
By: Helmi Krappitz
The UN World Summit on Nature decides on an agreement to protect 30 percent of land and sea areas by 2030. Experts doubt whether this is possible.
MONTREAL – The 15th UN World Summit on Nature, COP15 for short, has agreed on an agreement called "Kunming-Montréal".
In the two-week negotiations, the 5,000 participants decided that at least 30 percent of the world's land and sea areas should be protected by 2030.
In addition, there should be more investment in species protection,
reports
zeit.de.
The COP15 was originally supposed to take place in China in 2020 and was postponed due to the corona pandemic.
The first part of the trial took place online in Kunming, China, last year.
Nature protection agreement: Opportunity to secure livelihoods
So far, only an estimated seven percent of the seas and 17 percent of the land have been protected.
The agreement of the 193 states should now offer protection for oceans and animals and prevent further pollution.
Around one million animal and plant species are threatened with extinction, according to scientists from the World Biodiversity Council.
The Council's goals are considered to have been met with the nature conservation agreements.
According to zeit.de
, the plenary session is
extremely satisfied with the success of a decision.
Federal Environment Minister Steffi Lemke shares this opinion: "The international community has decided to finally stop the extinction of species." The adopted goals now offer a great opportunity to initiate the trend reversal that is so urgently needed to overcome the biodiversity crisis and thus secure the livelihoods of present and future generations.”
Many animal species are endangered because of marine pollution.
(Iconic image) © IMAGO/ Ardea
Criticism of the agreement: no legal commitment and too much room for interpretation
The agreement states that coastal and marine areas should be “effectively conserved”.
The Tagesschau reports on the criticism of the lack of a definition of what that should mean exactly.
Non-governmental organizations are also skeptical.
The world is “rushing towards an abyss in the natural and climate crisis.
But instead of braking decisively, she just slows down a little,” says Jörg-Andreas Krüger, President of the nature conservation association NABU.
The goals have been pushed too far into the future.
Criticism also comes from some politicians.
For example,
zeit.de
primarily reports objections from representatives of poorer countries.
Richer countries are supposed to support poorer countries with almost 20 billion dollars a year until 2025.
The representative of the Democratic Republic of the Congo nevertheless criticized the lack of aid.
The objections of the poorer countries were not sufficiently taken into account when the agreement was passed.
Now it is a matter of implementing the agreement.
It is important that the federal states tackle the measures despite the lack of a legal obligation.
Many goals are described incompletely in the document and leave a lot of room for interpretation.
Each country must decide for itself how and whether the goals are to be implemented.