Forest, desertification, land degradation & biodiversity

Photo credit: The Woods Hole Research Center.

Survival of Forests is Vital for Reaching Climate Change Goals

By Jutta Wolf*

BERLIN (IDN) – A key solution to saving tropical forests is to secure the land rights of the indigenous peoples and local communities, and to invest in them as an effective strategy for reducing deforestation and slowing climate change, according to the new findings released in Berlin on November 1.

It was no surprise therefore when Mina Setra, Deputy Secretary General of The Indigenous Peoples’ Alliance of the Archipelago (AMAN), said: "We are a proven solution to the long-term protection of forests, whose survival is vital for reaching our climate change goals. Yet in return, we face human rights violations, violence to our communities, criminalization of our peoples and the murder of our leaders." The Alliance represents 17 million people in Indonesia.

: Jutta Wolf; SUSTAINABILITY; Climate Action; 01 November 2017

Protecting Chimps is in Our Self-Interest, Says Eminent Conservationist

By J Nastranis

NEW YORK | MANILA (IDN) – Chimpanzees – which share some 99 per cent of their DNA with us – are in trouble, despite national protection efforts across Africa, says the world-renowned conservationist Ian Redmond.

“Although our zoological next of kin with the widest distribution of any ape apart from ourselves, they are an endangered species. Most are declining in number – victims of habitat loss and poaching – and have been extirpated in at least three, possibly five other countries,” he said.

Redmond – who is Ambassador to the Convention on Migratory Species – was speaking from the Philippines where he is participating in this year’s largest global wildlife summit. The triennial meeting of the Convention on Migratory Species (CMS COP12), which opened in Manila on October 23, has agreed to list Chimpanzees on both its Appendices to offer them much-needed trans-border protection.

: J Nastranis; SUSTAINABILITY; Forests, desertification, land degradation & biodiversity; 27 October 2017

Photo: Anders Oskal from Norway's International Centre for Reindeer Husbandry said the Arctic Council’s Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme works with reindeer herders and how they deal with climate change. Credit: Lowana Veal | IDN-INPS.

Traditional Knowledge and Education Major Themes at Arctic Circle Assembly

By Lowana Veal

REYKJAVIK (IDN) – “Islanders have nothing to do with climate change though they may suffer the most,” Nainoa Thompson from the Polynesian Voyaging Society told an Arctic Circle seminar focusing on global perspectives on traditional knowledge, science and climate change. Thompson comes from Hawaii, but his co-speakers came from Thailand, Chad, Fiji, Kenya and Norwegian Lapland.

The plight of South Pacific islanders was one of the main themes of this year’s Arctic Circle Assembly, organised in Reykjavik for the fifth consecutive year. This year’s event (held from October 13 to 15) was particularly broad in scope, with a choice of 105 breakout sessions (seminars) as well as speeches and panel discussions.

: Lowana Veal; SUSTAINABILITY; Gender Equality; 25 October 2017

Photo: Courtesy Tenure Facility / Madre de Dios region, Peruvian Amazon.

Giving Visibility – and Land Rights – to the Indigenous

By Fabíola Ortiz

STOCKHOLM (IDN) – Indigenous peoples are all but invisible on the development agenda but a hoped for change is on the cards with the launch of the world’s first and only funding institution to support the efforts of local and native communities to secure rights over their lands and resources.

“Include us, so that we can protect our lands for our children and protect the planet’s biodiversity for all the world’s children,” said by Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples during the launch. Recognising the land rights of native and traditional peoples is a low-cost solution toward achieving the world’s development, environment and climate agendas.

: Fabiola Ortiz; THE WORLD; Latin America & the Caribbean; 07 October 2017

Over 110 Countries Commit to Halt Land Degradation

By Jaya Ramachandran

BERLIN | ORDOS CITY, China (IDN) – Land degradation is one of the planet’s most pressing global challenges. A third of the world’s land is degraded. But the good news is that by the end of the 13th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 13) to the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) on September 16, 2017 in China's Ordos City, 113 countries had agreed to specify concrete targets, with clear indicators, to reverse degradation and rehabilitate more land.

A new global roadmap to address land degradation was also agreed. The UNCCD 2018-2030 Strategic Framework is regarded as the most comprehensive global commitment to achieve Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN) in order to restore the productivity of vast swathes of degraded land, improve the livelihoods of more than 1.3 billion people, and to reduce the impacts of drought on vulnerable populations.

: Jaya Ramachandran; UN INSIDER; 16 September 2017

China Hosts A Milestone UN Conference on Land Degradation

By Rita Joshi

BONN | ORDOS CITY (IDN) – A new strategy aimed at achieving Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN) by 2030 will be a major outcome of the 13th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 13) to the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), which opened in Ordos, Inner Mongolia, China, on September 6.

This is the first Conference hosted by China out of the three 1992 Earth Summit's Rio Conventions – on biological diversity and Climate Change, according to UNCCD Executive Secretary Monique Barbut. The target to be achieved between 2018 and 2030 has indicators to measure change. It provides "an organizing principle that we can all rally behind and achieve a specific change."

: Rita Joshi; UN INSIDER; 08 September 2017

Photo: Selous Game Reserve. Credit: UNESO | Evergreen

Tanzania Plans Hydroelectric Plant on World Heritage Site

By Global Information Network

PARIS | NEW YORK (IDN) - "The Selous Game Reserve, covering 50,000 square kilometres, is amongst the largest protected areas in Africa and is relatively undisturbed by human impact," says UNESCO, which decided in 2014 to include it in the List of World Heritage in danger.

Notwithstanding the prominent status given to Selous Game Reserve by including it among world's 54 properties of "outstanding universal value", and much to the dismay of environmentalists, Tanzanian President John Magufuli has invited bids for a 2,100-megawatt hydroelectric plant. The project would more than double the country’s power generation capacity, ending chronic electricity shortages.

: Global Information Network; NEWSBRIEFS; 07 September 2017

Photo: A snow leopard in Kyrgyzstan’s Shamshy Wildlife Sanctuary. Credit: SLF Kyrgyzstan / Snow Leopard Trust

Globally Endangered Snow Leopard Draws the Focus

By Sultan Karimov

BISHKEK (IDN) - An elusive denizen of the mountains of Central and South Asia, the snow leopard (panthera uncia) inhabits parts of 12 countries: Afghanistan, Bhutan, China, India, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyz Republic, Mongolia, Nepal, Pakistan, Russia, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan.

Its geographic range, 60 percent of which is in China, runs from the Hindu Kush in eastern Afghanistan and the Syr Darya through the mountains of Pamir, Tian Shan, Karakorum, Kashmir, Kunlun, and the Himalaya to southern Siberia, where the range covers the Russian Altai, Sayan, Tannu-Ola mountains and the mountains to the west of Lake Baikal.

: IDN-INPS UN Bureau; UN INSIDER; 26 August 2017

Photo: CMS Scientific Council Sessional Committee - 2nd meeting in Bonn Credit: Aydin Bahramlouian

UN Conference to Focus on World’s Endangered Wildlife

By Rita Joshi

BERLIN (IDN) – Protecting the world's endangered wildlife from unsustainable tourism, lead poisoning, underwater noise, and the transition to clean energy will be some of the themes at the centre of a major global meeting which kicks off in Manila in less than three months.

More than 120 countries will gather in the Philippine capital for the 12th session of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Migratory Species (CMS COP12) from October 23 to 28 2017. The meeting will focus on an array of critical issues facing the world’s endangered wildlife shared across international borders. The CMS Secretariat is based in Bonn

: Rita Joshi; UN INSIDER; 25 July 2017

Photo: African ministers at the global observance of the World Day to Combat Desertification in Burkina Faso.

African Ministers Keen to Halt Migration of Jobless Youth

By Rita Joshi

BONN (IDN) – Senior government ministers from several African countries have emphasized the need for addressing the plight of jobless young people in sub-Saharan Africa. Ignoring their predicament is a recipe for political instability and global insecurity, warned a high-level symposium of Africa's interior, environment and foreign affairs ministers in Ouagadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso,

The Symposium on June 15 examined the threats connected to sustainability, stability and security, namely, conflicts linked to access to degrading natural resources, instability due to unemployment of rural youth and insecurity and the risk of the radicalization triggered by social and economic marginalization and exposure to extremist groups.