MEDIA STATEMENT

World's Leading Climate and Biodiversity Scientists Propose First-Ever Action Plan to Address Interlinked Crises  

WASHINGTON, DC (10 June 2021) — A new, peer-reviewed report by 50 climate and biodiversity experts released today asserts that biodiversity loss and climate change are both driven by human economic activities and mutually reinforce each other, and that neither will be successfully resolved unless both are tackled together. 

The report findings echo a recent communiqué by G7 leaders calling for greater and more coordinated climate and biodiversity action. 

Studies have shown that climate change is one of the main drivers of biodiversity loss and that ecosystems and species play a major function in regulating climate, as carbon sinks, as well as enhancing adaptation and resilience to climate change. 

Nature-based solutions (NBS), in particular the large-scale protection and restoration of key ecosystems, are essential for meeting the Paris climate agreement. NBS can provide up to 37% of mitigation needed to meet the goal. 

Protecting at least 30% of the planet, if done in the right locations, is a nature-based solution with enormous biodiversity and climate benefits, including climate change resilience, adaptation and mitigation.

The new report, the cooperation between the climate and biodiversity scientists, and the policy recommendations they put forward are groundbreaking.  Climate and biodiversity research and policy have been largely siloed for the past several decades leading to recent calls for a more integrated approach to address the overlapping crises.

Enric Sala, Explorer in Residence, National Geographic Society, said:

"We cannot think of global warming and the loss of nature as different crises. They are one and the same. The cause of our global crisis is our abuse of our life support system, our increasing destruction and pollution of the natural world for the sake of unfettered economic growth. This important report reminds us that the major solutions include protecting at least 30% of the planet by 2030, changing the way we produce food, and reducing our greenhouse gas emissions to near zero by 2050."

Brian O’Donnell, the director of the Campaign for Nature, said:

“The era of confronting the nature and climate crises in isolation must come to an end.  The world’s leading nature and climate scientists have shown us a path forward where we prioritize climate actions that benefit nature.  If world leaders agree to protect at least 30% of the planet’s lands and oceans and secure the land tenure rights of Indigenous Peoples and local communities, we can make huge progress for climate and nature.”

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The Campaign for Nature works with scientists, Indigenous Peoples, and a growing coalition of over 100 conservation organizations around the world who are calling on policymakers to commit to clear and ambitious targets to be agreed upon at the 15th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity in Kunming, China in 2021 to protect at least 30% of the planet by 2030 and working with Indigenous leaders to ensure full respect for Indigenous rights.

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