Protected Planet

August 12, 2020
Liveability, sustainability, resilience and equity; goals that frame countless discussions in city halls across the world. Yet how often are these goals considered in the context of protected areas for nature within and around the city?

We know protected areas generate flows of goods and services that benefit all of us: medicine, food, clean air and fresh water. They buffer the effects of climate change: heat stress, flash flooding and storm surges. They give meaning to proud cultures and create a sense of place and belonging for communities. They are learning places, exciting places, places for adventure where real beauty can be experienced away from screens and technology. Yet rapid urbanisation and sub-urbanisation in many parts of the world is placing them under mounting pressure.

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Our Daily Planet

August 9, 2020
Yesterday was the International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples.  In recognition of that, and the key role Indigenous peoples are playing in the conservation movement today in the U.S. and globally, we sat down with Raina Thiele, who is Dena’ina Athabascan, and Yup’ik, and has worked at the highest levels of government on Tribal outreach and issues. She now runs her own business and serves as an advisor on Indigenous issues to the Campaign for Nature.

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The Guardian

August 5, 2020
The human destruction of natural ecosystems increases the numbers of rats, bats and other animals that harbour diseases that can lead to pandemics such as Covid-19, a comprehensive analysis has found.

The research assessed nearly 7,000 animal communities on six continents and found that the conversion of wild places into farmland or settlements often wipes out larger species. It found that the damage benefits smaller, more adaptable creatures that also carry the most pathogens that can pass to humans.

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BBC Future

August 3, 2020
After defaulting on its substantial national debt, the Seychelles was offered an unusual deal.

Located around 1,600 kilometres (994 miles) off the coast of East Africa, the Seychelles is an ecological paradise. The archipelago of 115 lush and rocky islands sits amongst vast swathes of ocean, covering some 1.35 million square kilometres (521,000 square miles). They’re home to some of the world’s last pristine coral reefs and are teeming with endangered species, including the southern fin whale and the Indian Ocean’s only dugongs – large marine mammals also known as “sea cows”.

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Project Syndicate

July 31, 2020
Natural systems like the massive Sundarbans mangrove forest in India and Bangladesh are not just home to millions of plant and animal species that deserve protection from human encroachment. They are also crucial sources of economic output and resilience, demanding far more protection than they currently receive.

When Cyclone Amphan came barreling up the Bay of Bengal this past May, South Asia’s first named storm of the year appeared to pose a massive threat to the people who live on the coastal floodplains and to the animals and plants – including many endangered species – that rely on these sensitive ecosystems. But nature came to the region’s rescue.

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Mongabay

July 23, 2020
As COVID-19 wreaks havoc on the world’s people and the global economy, a group of international researchers is looking to the future. Their ground-breaking work underscores the immense economic benefits of expanding global protected areas to include 30% of the world’s land and oceans in order to accelerate recovery from the pandemic.

The report, authored by more than 100 economists and environmentalists for the advocacy group Campaign for Nature and published earlier this month, claims to be the first analysis ever to measure the economic benefits and costs of protecting 30% of the planet’s land and seas. The U.N. Convention on Biological Diversity included this 30% protected area goal as part of its ten-year conservation strategy which is expected to be ratified by 196 countries at an international summit in Kunming, China, next year.

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National Geographic - OpEd

July 20, 2020
Since my childhood by the Mediterranean Sea, I’ve been enchanted by the diversity of life on our planet and eager to learn all I could about it. I’ve spent much of my career studying the ocean food web, where in the course of natural events the smallest of the small are consumed by larger and larger predators, often ending in us. But scientists know there is more to the story, and I’ve been humbled to see life on our planet brought to a standstill by a tiny virus.

From a Wuhan, China, “wet market” where freshly butchered meat and live wild animals are sold for food and medicine, the virus likely was transmitted in late 2019 via wildlife to humans. And in a matter of months, COVID-19 has felled hundreds of thousands of Homo sapiens, Earth’s preeminent predator.

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China Dialogue

July 20, 2020
Two major reports, by the World Economic Forum and the Campaign for Nature, describe the vast economic benefits of protecting and restoring the living world

Businesses that add value to nature instead of degrading and destroying it could tap into a $10.1 trillion opportunity which could create 395 million jobs by 2030.

This is the central finding of a major new analysis by the World Economic Forum (WEF). The report is the second of three from the forum’s New Nature Economy series, which aims to demonstrate the relevance of nature-loss to boardroom discussions on risks, opportunities and financing.

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World Economic Forum

July 14, 2020
The Future of Nature and Business, the second of three reports in the World Economic Forum’s New Nature Economy series, provides the practical insights needed to take leadership in shifting towards a much needed nature-positive economy.

As the world prepares to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic and resulting crisis, we are presented with an unprecedented clarion call, and opportunity, to change the way we eat, live, grow, build and power our lives to achieve a carbon-neutral, ‘nature-positive’ economy and halt biodiversity loss by 2030. Business as usual is no longer an option.

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Asia Times

July 10, 2020
In the most comprehensive report to date on the economic implications of protecting nature, more than 100 economists and scientists find that the global economy would benefit from the establishment of far more protected areas on land and at sea than exist today.

The report considers various scenarios of protecting at least 30% of the planet to show that the benefits outweigh the costs by a ratio of at least 5-to-1. It offers new evidence that the nature conservation sector drives economic growth, delivers key non-monetary benefits, and is a net contributor to a resilient global economy.

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Phys.org

July 8, 2020
In the most comprehensive report to date on the economic implications of protecting nature, over 100 economists and scientists find that the global economy would benefit from the establishment of far more protected areas on land and at sea than exist today. The report considers various scenarios of protecting at least 30% of the world's land and ocean to find that the benefits outweigh the costs by a ratio of at least 5-to-1. The report offers new evidence that the nature conservation sector drives economic growth, delivers key non-monetary benefits and is a net contributor to a resilient global economy.

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Latercera

July 9, 2020
A recent report ensures that the conservation, restoration and creation of protected areas that cover around 30% of biodiversity and nature - terrestrial and marine - would generate enormous economic and financial benefits on a global scale and, furthermore, avoid the alarming collapse of the natural world that now threatens the extinction of up to a million species. Although for this, it is necessary, it is necessary to increase the investment to approximately 140 billion dollars on average in the next ten years, versus the 24 billion dollars today.

The study called " Protection of 30% of the planet for nature: costs, benefits and economic implications " , was prepared with the work of more than 100 scientists and economists who are part of the Campaign for Nature and Peoples (promoted by National Geographic and the Wyss Foundation). This is the most comprehensive global assessment of the financial and economic impacts of protected areas to date, and considers sectors such as agriculture, fisheries and forestry.

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WEF Blog

July 8, 2020
[…] A comprehensive report, Protecting 30% of the planet for nature: costs, benefits and economic implications, has arrived just in time. It concludes that the benefits of protecting 30% of the world’s land and ocean outweigh the costs by a factor of at least 5:1. This economic assessment follows the urgent call from scientists to protect at least 30% of the earth’s land and sea by 2030 to halt the collapse of biodiversity.

The IMF estimates that $10 trillion has been spent so far on official COVID-19 support measures worldwide, and forecasts global GDP will contract by an unprecedented 4.9% in 2020. Protecting 30% of the world’s land and ocean would require just 0.016% of global GDP. This seems like a very low insurance premium and incredibly safe bet on a system that has proven its sound productivity for over 3 billion years.

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CBC

July 8, 2020
With Earth's wildlife now facing an extinction crisis, a group of economists and scientists is hoping to persuade governments that it pays to protect nature.

Specifically, expanding areas under conservation could yield a return of at least $5 for every $1 spent just by giving nature more room to thrive.

That in turn would boost agricultural and forestry yields, improve freshwater supplies, preserve wildlife and help fight climate change — all of which would boost global economic output on average by about $337 billion ($250 billion US) annually, the group of more than 100 researchers argues in a paper published online Wednesday by The Campaign for Nature, a coalition of conservation organizations from around the world.

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The Guardian

July 8, 2020
Nearly a third of the world’s oceans and land area could be placed under environmental protections without harming the global economy, and even produce bumper economic benefits if the right policies were followed, according to a global assessment.

Ecosystems around the world are collapsing or hovering on the brink of disaster, with a million species threatened with extinction. But if at least 30% of the planet’s land and oceans were subject to conservation efforts, that mass extinction could be avoided and vital habitats restored, scientists estimate.

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