Section 12
Thematic reviews

12.4. Biodiversity: Highlights of 2022 and Related Activities in CA

Prepared by Z.R. Yarullina, D.R. Ziganshina (SIC ICWC)

Great things are accomplished with huge resources;
however, the nature gives great gifts for free

(A.I. Herzen)

The 2019 Water Yearbook provided an overview of major trends in global biodiversity based on the assessments by IPBES, OECD and FAO. Here we summarize key findings of the 15th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (COP 15) held in 2022, as well as the priorities and activities of the Central Asian countries on biodiversity protection.

Introduction

Biodiversity is the diversity of all different kinds of life and a measure of complexity of biological system and heterogeneity of its elements. Biodiversity is all the different kinds of life you’ll find in one area—the variety of animals, plants, fungi, and even microorganisms like bacteria and their interactions within and between species and their habitats.

While there is a growing recognition that biological diversity is a global asset of tremendous value to present and future generations, the number of flora and fauna species continues rapidly declining. The loss of biodiversity results from destruction of natural habitats, overexploitation of natural resources, water and soil pollution, and the invasive alien species.

The main causes of biodiversity damage and disturbance are as follows:

• degradation or complete destruction of natural habitats due to urbanization, tourism development, farming expansion, and growing transport, fisheries, mining and forestry infrastructures;

• intensive and inconsistent use of wild plants, timber, animals and resulting products (excess fishing or hunting, deforestation, etc.) for local or international trade combined with illegal trade;

• water, soil and air pollution by industrial, agricultural and household wastes;

• introduction of invasive exotic species;

• climate change disturbing habitats of species, forcing them to relocate or adapt to new conditions.

Facts and figures

• Current negative trends in biodiversity will undermine progress towards 80% of the assessed targets of 8 Sustainable Development Goals.

• Three-quarters of the land-based environment and about 66% of the marine environment have been significantly altered by human actions.

• 1 million animal and plant species are now threatened with extinction.

Convention on Biological Diversity and Outcomes of COP15

The global agreement for biodiversity is the Convention on Biological Diversity. The three main objectives of the Convention are: (1) the conservation of biological diversity; (2) the sustainable use of its components; (3) the fair and equitable sharing of the benefits arising out of the utilization of genetic resources, including by appropriate access to genetic resources and by appropriate transfer of relevant technologies, taking into account all rights over those resources and to technologies, and by appropriate funding. 196 countries, including the CA countries, are the parties of the Convention, as of January 2023.

The parties to the Convention took on the core obligations in part of implementation of measures for: conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity by developing and implementing national strategies, plans or programs (Article 6); identification and monitoring of components of biological diversity and organization of this data (Article 7); in-situ conservation by establishing a system of protected areas and a regulatory-legal framework for management of the areas to maintain and restore viable populations of species in natural surroundings (Article 8); ex-situ conservation by implementing measures for the recovery and rehabilitation of components of biological diversity outside their natural habitats (Article 9); sustainable use of components of biological diversity by integrating consideration of the conservation and sustainable use of biological resources into decision-making and regulation (Article 10); impact assessment and minimizing adverse impacts by introducing appropriate procedures requiring environmental impact assessment and implementing actions for prevention of threats to biological diversity (Article 14).

COP15 and key messages

The 15th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity was held in Montreal, Canada on 7-19 December . The Parties to the Convention expressed their concern that “while there has been encouraging progress towards achievement of the Aichi Biodiversity Targets, national targets set by Parties through their national biodiversity strategies and action plans were collectively not commensurate with the level of ambition set out in the Aichi Biodiversity Targets and implementation has been limited”.

Decisions. To accelerate efforts in this direction, a package of documents was adopted by the Conference, including the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework and the related monitoring framework; mechanisms for planning, monitoring, reporting and review; resource mobilization strategy; capacity-building and development and technical and scientific cooperation actions; and, arrangements on digital sequence information on genetic resources. Also, the Parties have agreed upon the Gender Plan of actions, the long-term strategic approach to mainstreaming biodiversity within and across sectors, the recommendations from the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues to the Convention on Biological Diversity, and actions relative to sustainable wildlife management, biodiversity and health, biodiversity and climate change, and synthetic biology.

One of big achievements of the Conference is the 30x30 commitment to protect 30% of the planet and 30% of degraded ecosystems by 2030. Among other goals and tasks, it is outlined in the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework. This Framework builds on the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011–2020, its achievements, gaps, and lessons learned, and the experience and achievements of other relevant multilateral environmental agreements. The Framework is an ambitious plan to implement broad-based action to bring about a transformation in our societies’ relationship with biodiversity by 2030, in line with the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its Sustainable Development Goals, and ensure that, by 2050, the shared vision of living in harmony with nature is fulfilled.

The Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework has four long-term goals for 2050 and 23 action-oriented global targets for urgent action over the decade to 2030. These are summarized below.

1. Reducing threats to biodiversity

• bring the loss of areas of high biodiversity importance close to zero (Target 1);

• restore at least 30% of areas of degraded terrestrial, inland water, and marine and coastal ecosystems (Target 2);

• create conditions for effective conservation and management of at least 30% of terrestrial and inland water areas, and of marine and coastal areas (Target 3);

• halt human induced extinction of known threatened species and recover and conserve species, in particular threatened species (Target 4);

• ensure that the use, harvesting and trade of wild species is sustainable, safe and legal (Target 5);

• eliminate, minimize, reduce and or mitigate the impacts of invasive alien species on biodiversity and ecosystem services (Target 6);

• reduce excess nutrients lost to the environment by at least half and the overall risk from pesticides and highly hazardous chemicals (Target 7);

• minimize the impact of climate change (Target 8);

2. Meeting people’s needs through sustainable use and benefit-sharing

• ensure that the management and use of wild species are sustainable, thereby providing benefits for people, especially those in vulnerable situations (Target 9);

• ensure that areas under agriculture, aquaculture, fisheries and forestry are managed sustainably (Target 10);

• restore, maintain and enhance nature’s contributions to people (Target 11);

• increase the area and quality of green and blue spaces in urban and densely populated areas (Target 12);

• take effective legal, policy, administrative and capacity-building measures at all levels, as appropriate, to ensure the fair and equitable sharing of benefits (Target 13);

3. Tools and solutions for implementation and mainstreaming

• full integration of biodiversity and its multiple values into policies, regulations, planning, strategies, assessments and national reports (Target 14);

• take measures to encourage and enable business for regular monitoring, assessment and transparent disclosure of their risks, dependencies and impacts on biodiversity (Target 15);

• ensure that people are encouraged and enabled to make sustainable consumption choices, reduce the global footprint of consumption in an equitable manner (Target 16);

• establish, strengthen capacity for, and implement in all countries, biosafety measures (Target 17);

• progressively reduce by at least $500 billion subsidies harmful for biodiversity (Target 18);

• mobilize at least $200 billion per year to implement national biodiversity strategies and action plans (Target 18);

• strengthen capacity-building and development, access to and transfer of technology, and promote development of and access to innovation and technical and scientific cooperation (Target 20);

• ensure that the best available data, information and knowledge are accessible (Target 21);

• ensure the full, equitable, inclusive, and effective representation and participation of indigenous peoples and local communities in decision making (Target 22);

• ensure gender equality in the implementation of the Framework through a gender-responsive approach, where all women and girls have equal opportunity and capacity to contribute to the three objectives of the Convention (Target 23).

As a whole, the Framework aims to restore degraded ecosystems, prevent the introduction of invasive alien species, reduce ecosystem pollution, including by pesticides, hazardous chemicals and plastics, improve management of areas under fisheries, agriculture and forestry, conduct regular monitoring and assessment of impact on biodiversity from large transnational companies and financial institutions and ensure transparency of this data. It also identifies the role of indigenous people and local communities in conservation, restoration and sustainable use of biodiversity. Besides, it makes provision for annual allocation of $200 billion for financing biodiversity related projects.

Each of the Framework’s targets will be supported by effective mechanisms for planning, monitoring, reporting and review.

Reflection of activists on the Conference outcomes

Decisions adopted at the Conference were viewed as a historical deal to stop destruction of the Earth’s ecosystems and preserve global biodiversity largely because of the adopted ‘30х30’ goal and the agreement to allocate $200 billion per year for environmental initiatives. The recognition of the indigenous people and women’ rights, the local environmental initiatives, the effective area protection, and the security and rights of nature activists were applauded.

At the same time, the outcomes were also criticized. There is not a strong scientific argument behind 30% as the threshold for staving off species loss, experts said. Additionally, it is not clear from the agreement, what should count as protection. For instance, some countries might allow people to live within protected areas or promote indigenous stewardship of these lands. Some might even allow for extractive industries to operate under permits and regulation. In other cases, conservation areas are off limits to everyone. Representatives of African countries, home to tropical rainforests, are concerned that developing countries have no funds for financing conservation effects and need support from developed countries to implement the agreed targets.

Executive Director of the Global Forest Coalition, Simone Lovera is concerned with a number of lost opportunities in the package of adopted decisions. First, she noted the absence of comprehensive technology horizon scanning. Activists hoped for strong texts on, for example, a horizon scanning mechanism for new technologies, or measures to reduce the risks of synthetic biology, genetically modified organisms, false climate solutions like bioenergy and carbon capture and sequestration, or the privatization and commercialization of genetic information through digital sequence information systems. Second, important proposals that would hold corporations legally accountable for damage caused to biodiversity were removed from the final Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) text, while the targets dealing with the role and accountability of the private sector and consumers were watered down to weak phrases. Third, deleted from the text were references to the need to change diets and/or food systems in general to reduce the impact of, in particular, unsustainable livestock farming, which is a primary cause of biodiversity loss and climate change. Fourth, she worries about weak implementation mechanisms that provide no guarantee that the lofty recommendations in the GBF will actually lead to concrete action on the ground.

Simone Lovera considered it ugly that the GBF risks corporate capture through private sector financing since, per se, the Framework opens the door for greenwashing (and potentially even whitewashing, as even illegally acquired money seems to be welcome) practices. Even uglier was the inclusion of “biodiversity offsets and credits” because one cannot simply replace a destroyed ecosystem with another ecosystem. Many NGOs and rightsholder groups were against the inclusion of the term “nature-based solutions” in the GBF since the so-called “nature-based solutions” tend to reinforce existing gender injustices by ignoring the rights, needs and livelihoods of rural women, girls and other underrepresented groups and frequently represent fraud schemes covering up projects that actually have a negative effect on the nature and climate.

The way forward

The success of the Framework and other Conference decisions will depend on how urgently countries, the private sector and civil society implement and mobilize resources. First, this means early revisiting and strengthening of existing national biodiversity strategies and action plans.

It is important to remember that the global community as a whole, including the CA countries, has failed on biodiversity conservation targets. Almost all targets set by the international community for 2020 have not been achieved.

Biodiversity priorities and activities of the Central Asian countries

This subsection discusses efforts made by the CA countries for fulfillment of their obligations under the Convention on Biological Diversity.

Regulatory and framework program

Based on obligations under the Convention on Biodiversity, the CA countries have adopted a number of legal documents in part of management and protection of the natural environment, including water and land, air, flora and fauna. A separate law regulating the matters related to the use and protection of natural areas is effective in all the CA countries.

The countries also have regulations concerning:

• control and monitoring of natural environment. For instance, the law on state monitoring of natural environment is under development in Turkmenistan. Provisions of the draft law are developed in line with international conventions and agreements and the Turkmenistan strategic priorities, such as conservation of biodiversity, sound use of natural resources, and protection of ecosystems. The Regulation on national environmental monitoring was accepted for bringing into effect in Uzbekistan. The document provides for monitoring of flora and fauna.

• control of bio-resources use, exportation and importation which is valid for all users of fauna. All the CA countries trade animals and plants, with some of these countries also serving as transit points. All the countries, except for Turkmenistan, are Parties to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) and have been implementing the Convention and related enforcement activities for many years.

• environmental impact assessment and measures for prevention or elimination of biodiversity risks (environmental expertise). Such regulations set key guidelines for documentary justification of actions that potentially affect the natural environment in given area.

Since environmental control is the key enforcement mechanism of environmental regulations, government bodies have powers to exercise control over compliance with the regulations, to stop or suspend illegal nature use or other harmful impact on the natural environment, as well as the right to give instructions which are binding for elimination of the causes and the consequences of offenses.

The CA countries have adopted its own strategies and national plans for biodiversity conservation (see key documents in the Table below).

National country reports on the Convention

In due time, the CA countries prepare and submit their reports to the Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity. As of 01.01.2023, each of the countries has prepared six national reports in line with reporting guidelines. The reports cover the period from 2013 to 2017, contain final reviews of results achieved through implementation of the Strategic Plan for the Conservation and Sustainable Use of Biodiversity for 2011-2020 and targets for conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity adopted in Aichi, including relevant national targets. Country reports are the important tool for the Conference of the Parties to track implementation and also the tool for planning biodiversity conservation activities at national level by providing analysis and monitoring needed for making timely decisions.

Future tasks

UNECE Environmental Performance Review identified a number of issues related to biodiversity conservation in CA. In particular, these are the declining trends in populations of several threatened species; all main representatives of natural and semi-natural ecosystems, providing important ecosystem services and habitats for the diversity of species increasingly threatened by anthropogenic pressures and adverse effects of ongoing global climate changes; countries particularly affected by adverse effects of climate changes, resulting in desertification, land degradation, and large-scale environmental disasters, e.g., in the Aral Sea region. Based on the assessment results, experts identified as a priority the need for undertaking urgent ecosystem restoration measures and enhancing spatial ecological connectivity (also, in transboundary scale) of ecosystems, which is particularly important during the 2021–2030 UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration.

Also, the Analytical review of biodiversity and significant ecosystems conservation priorities in Central Asia highlights that the countries of Central Asia have gained a unique biodiversity but natural areas are under great pressure since a substantial part of population in Central Asia still lives in rural areas relying heavily on natural resources as means of existence.

Despite all efforts, forest cover in Central Asia has recently been declining for many reasons, including urbanization, agricultural development, climate change, growing demand for timber, and expansion of plantations for species not typical for the region.

The economic, political, social, cultural challenges the region faces are often at variance with the goals of ecosystem conservation, and therefore new, sustainable approaches to dealing with issues of the day are required, since biodiversity degradation will lead to an increase in poverty, inequality, conflict, migration flows and reduce the ability of local communities to resist the impact of climate change.

The analysis identified key areas of activity, prospects for effective cooperation and provided recommendations for the achievement of concrete results on biodiversity protection and conservation in the CA countries, including the following:

• align the national biodiversity targets with the UN SDG15 adopted by all CA countries;

• harmonize national biodiversity terminology in the region with the Multilateral Environmental Conventions glossaries;

• set the targets and time frames for all national biodiversity goals;

• improve the legal framework on transboundary protected areas and biosphere reserves;

• develop a mechanism for the assessment of the economic value of biodiversity and ecosystem services;

• identify areas that have to be preserved and have a high conservation value, but have no conservation status or special regime of use;

• strengthen financial support mechanisms for biodiversity conservation activities;

• build the capacity of personnel of government bodies in charge of biodiversity management;

• widen engagement of local communities and the public concerned in environmental activities, empower social movements and groups;

• impose a moratorium on the development and use of pristine/primary forests in Central Asia, establish protection regimes for this type of ecosystems;

• develop and maintain cross-border cooperation between the countries of Central Asia;

• exchange genetic resources through international institutions and gene banks;

• interact with international development agencies and financial organizations to attract international experience and resources for biodiversity conservation;

• develop the Red List of Ecosystems of Central Asia.