By Fatima Saka
Africa leaders and experts across the African continent called for an emergent increase in finance to protect the world’s biodiversity, as Africa is the world’s second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia.
This was said at the Africa Nature Finance Forum, which was held on Thursday in Gabon on the sidelines of the inaugural African Protected Areas Congress (APAC) 2022.
Minister of Water, Forests, the Sea, and Environment, Gabon, Lee White, revealed that “By 2100, we may lose half of our bird and animal species, 20-30% of the productivity of African lakes and significant numbers of our plant species.
“Without strong action, we will create instability and security issues all over the African continent. One of the key elements is the mobilization of predictable and sustainable resources. This is why we need to think about innovative and sustainable finance for nature.”
The natural world is disappearing at an unprecedented rate. One million plant and animal species now face extinction, many within decades, and 60% of terrestrial wildlife populations have been lost in the last fifty years.
However, to address this crisis, governments, indigenous Peoples and local communities (IPLCs), environmental organizations, and businesses are to work together to develop a new framework to guide biodiversity conservation for the next decade, known as the post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF).
This global agreement will be finalized at the 15th Conference of the Parties (COP15) to the U.N. Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) to take place in Montreal, Canada, in December 2022. Meanwhile, without sufficient financing, addressing the biodiversity crisis will not be possible, and this critical global agreement may be elusive.
Also, speaking Minister of Environment, Nigeria, Mohammed H. Abdullahi, said “It is crucial that we lead by example, today, only 15% of the world’s land mass and 7% of the oceans are protected. So far, African nations have created over 2 million sq km of protected areas which is an indication of our joint commitment to the preservation of Africa’s rich biodiversity, but we need to do more together and protect at least 30% of the world’s land and seas by 2030.”
Going further, the governments of Nigeria and Gabon which hosted the Africa Nature Finance Forum discussed how Africa can build on its historical and cultural traditions of protecting ecosystems and biodiversity, support the financing of biodiversity, and leverage increased financing from donor countries around the world.
In conjunction, the leaders at the Africa Nature Finance Forum called on world leaders to support, and commit to, the African proposal that all nations commit 1% of GDP to address the biodiversity finance gap and protect our planet’s future.
“The global biodiversity finance gap stands at US$ 700 billion: committing 1% of global GDP would generate US$ 850 billion. And the great thing about the 1% proposal is that this is Africa’s idea. It shows initiative and financial leadership from Africa,” said Abdullahi.
Also, Sikeade Egbuwalo, national focal point to the CBD for Federal Department of Forestry, Federal Ministry of Environment to the CBD, Nigeria expressed that “We are not begging for you to give us the money to protect our biodiversity, we are committing 1% of our GDP, you also should do the same in your countries, as well as the ODA that flows down to developing countries”.
