16 April 2022 | New Scientist | 49of Campaign for Nature, a global coalition
of conservation organisations. “It must
remain in the final agreement.” The draft
has already been through considerable
peer review, but that doesn’t mean it will
survive final negotiations among high-level
government representatives. “As we get
closer to signing, I suspect there’ll be some
resistance,” says Woodley.
That resistance is likely to come from
low-income countries where most of the
planet’s remaining biodiversity resides.
Their beef is that high-income nations have
already wrecked their own biodiversity in
pursuit of economic growth, and now want
them to resist doing the same. “Countries like
Brazil are saying: ‘OK, you want me to protect
the Amazon – what’s in it for me?’ ” says
Woodley. “They’re stating that rather forcefully
and they’re not wrong.” The negotiations
will quite possibly hinge on a sticking point
familiar from climate negotiations: theLU
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L>Yet even as early as 2010, many biologists
were arguing for far higher targets, based on a
realisation that representative samples weren’t
enough. Effective conservation meant keeping
species in their natural distribution and
abundance, building buffers against extinction
and enabling the whole ecosystem to function,
while keeping ecosystem services healthy and
building resilience to environmental changes
such as global warming.
That requires more land. “There are many
studies now showing that if we want to protect
not only the biodiversity and all the benefits
that it provides to humanity, including carbon
sequestration and storage and freshwater
provision, we need about half of the planet
in its natural state,” says marine biologist
Enric Sala at the National Geographic Society.
The CBD cites eight key papers in support of a
30 per cent minimum. Most studies settle on
50 per cent plus and some go as high as 80 per
cent. A few dip below 30 per cent, but always
with disclaimers. Importantly, says Stephen
Woodley at the International Union for
Conservation of Nature (IUCN), there are no
studies showing that healthy biodiversity can
be maintained with much less than 30 per cent.
That’s why the 30 by 30 ambition has
become so central to the negotiations ahead of
COP15 in Kunming, the latest CBD conference.
It would mean roughly doubling conserved
land areas and quadrupling protected marine
areas. This is an extremely ambitious target,
says Leadley, and there are all sorts of nagging
fears: that 30 by 30 will be watered down
or dropped from the final text; that if it does
make the cut, it won’t be reached; and that
if it is reached, it won’t achieve its stated goal
of effectively protecting biodiversity.
“The 30 by 30 target is an absolute
must-have for any global agreement to be
successful,” says Brian O’Donnell, director“ 30 by 30 is a
must-have for
any agreement
to conserve
biodiversity”
The Guapiaçu Ecological Reserve
protects threatened Atlantic Forest
landscape in Rio de Janeiro state, Brazil