NEW GLOBAL BIODIVERSITY FRAMEWORK

1. Context

2. Biodiversity Importance

• Biodiversity often called the web of life, biodiversity signifies the variety of species on earth, which are all connected and sustain the balance of ecosystems, enabling humans to coexist. They interact with the environment to perform a host of functions.
• The CBD states that only about 1.75 million species have so far been identified, including numerous insects, while there may be some 13 million species.
• Some familiar ecosystem services rendered by diverse living forms, of which plants and animals are the most visible, include providing humans with food, fuel, fiber, shelter, building materials, air and water purification, stabilization of climate, pollination of plants including those used in agriculture, and moderating the effects of flood, drought, extreme temperatures, and wind.
• Disruption of these produces severe impacts such as failed agriculture, aberrant climate patterns, and cascading losses of species that accelerate the degradation of the earth.

3. What is Kunming Montreal Global Biodiversity framework?

• The Global Biodiversity Framework is considered equivalent to the Paris Agreement on climate change in terms of its significance for protecting biodiversity.
• The 15th Conference of Parties (COP15) to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) adopted the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) on December 19, 2022. The framework has 23 targets that the world needs to achieve by 2030.
• The targets are ambitious, considering that biodiversity is in a poor state. In 2020, the world failed to meet the last set of targets, the Aichi Targets. Countries would need to ensure success this time around.
• This agreement means people around the world can hope for real progress to halt biodiversity loss and protect and restore our lands and seas in a way that safeguards our planet and respects the rights of indigenous peoples and local communities.

3.1 Key Points

• Through Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF), countries agreed to protect 30 percent of the planet by 2030.
• The countries pledged to achieve 23 targets to reverse ecosystem degradation under four overarching goals for the survival of the natural world.
• Under the Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF), countries also agreed to reduce harmful government subsidies worth 500 billion dollars annually, while vowing to identify subsidies that are harmful to biodiversity by 2025.
• Its other targets include reducing the use of pesticides by half and raising annual international financial flows from developed to developing countries to at least 20 billion dollars by 2025, and to at least 30 billion dollars by 2030.

• Opened for signature in 1992 at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janerio, and entering into force in December 1993, the CBD is an international treaty for the conservation of biodiversity, the sustainable use of the components of biodiversity, and the equitable sharing of the benefits derived from the use of genetic resources.
• With 196 Parties, the CBD has near universal participation among countries. The Convention seeks to address all threats to biodiversity and ecosystem services, including threats from climate change, through scientific assessments, the development of tools, incentives, and processes, the transfer of technologies and good practices, and the full and active involvement of relevant stakeholders including indigenous peoples and local communities, youth, women, NGO's, sub-national actors and the business community. The Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety and the Nagoya Protocol on Access and Benefit-sharing is a supplementary agreement to the CBD.

5. What funding arrangements are planned?

• By 2030, the GBF hopes to see at least $200 billion raised per year from all sources towards the implementation of national action plans. In terms of international funding, developing countries should get at least $20 billion a year by 2025 and at least $30 billion by 2030 through contributions from developed countries.
• The Global Environment Facility (GEF), a multilateral body that partners with countries and agencies, has been asked to establish in 2023, and until 2030, a Special Trust Fund to support the implementation of the GBF.

For Prelims & Mains