Issue Brief May 2018

Relaunching the international ambition for biodiversity

A three-dimensional vision for the future of the Convention on Biological Diversity

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In Beijing at the end of 2020, the international community will see how the objectives it set itself in 2010 have not been achieved, and will have to find the terms for an agreement that is commensurate with the challenges.

This Issue Brief clarifies the challenges that must be faced at this event by focusing on three issues: 

- the regime of objectives and targets; 
- the mechanism of the convention; 
- and other legal initiatives or instruments that can be envisaged and linked with the CBD. 

This analysis is complementary to another Issue Brief, which details the milestones and steps along the pathway towards the end of 2020.

Read also the Chinese version of this Issue Brief201805-IB0618CH-CBD%20post%202020.JPG

Key messages

  • To once again merely postpone these objectives, which were set 10 years ago, to the end of the next decade without achieving them, would be a sign that the Convention on Biological Diversity is powerless.
     
  • Renewing the system of objectives implies the evaluation of what they have brought to biodiversity policy in the countries that have adopted them.
     
  • Giving strength to the future objectives will only be possible through a more precise allocation of responsibilities for each country, and thus a form of individualization of targets.
     
  • The ingredients for the success of the Paris Agreement are analysed here. To draw inspiration for biodiversity from these findings will particularly require the linking of global ambitions with the commitments of states and non-state actors.
     
  • The Convention on Biological Diversity is not the only focus of international action for biodiversity. Other legal instruments could be initiated, for example regarding pesticides, and linked to the CBD that could serve as a "matrix" of international commitments.
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Authors

Aleksandar Rankovic

Aleksandar Rankovic

Sciences Po

Fiona Kinniburgh

Fiona Kinniburgh

Research Fellow, International Biodiversity Governance

Damien Demailly

Damien Demailly

I4CE Deputy Director

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