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While the complex systems of living things feed us and provide extensive ecosystem services, these are not presently valued. Accounts directly in species and ecosystems could encourage the protection and regeneration of the natural systems essential for our survival.

Facilitator:
Working group members:

Description

short description

Link to the section of the background paper

Visuals/diagrams

Ideal state

Natural ecosystems staying intact and stable, climate (atmosphere), land (eg forests, agricultural areas), oceans-lakes-rivers
capital of natural ecosystems and species maintained

BIODIVERSITY CAPITAL:
Animals (including insects) 7,77 million, described 0,953 million
Plants 0,298 million, described 0,216 million
Fungi (moulds, mushrooms) 0,611 million, described 0,043 million
Protozoa (single-cell organisms with animal-like behavior) 0,036 million, described 0,008 million
Chromista (brown algae, diatoms, etc) 0,027 million, described 0,013 million
Total species 8,74 million, described 1,233 million
(not including microbes)

Non-financial currency

Major groups of species, or indicator species
Ecosystem services

Positive indicators

Reforestation to capture carbon
Protection of natural areas
- number and areas of nature reserves expanded on land and at sea
- Green belt project
- some endangered species removed from Red Lists (eg Panda bears)
Education
- awareness of human behaviour on biodiversity
- bring scientific methods to be used by people at all levels

Negative indicators

Ecosystems have declined by 47% decrease of forest areas and other habitats
25% of species threatened with extinction
Average atmospheric air temperature rising: increasing GHG levels, mainly CO2
Human population growth (doubled in last 50 years)
Bio-industry-antibiotics health effects
Too much negative impact from present food cycle:
- industrial/chemical farming
- food waste (1/3)
- soil erosion/depletion
- land and water pollution

Strategies

30 by 30 target: 30% land and sea protected area by 2030
Cut subsidies for fossil fuels ad harmful industries
Develop appropriate legislation in domestic and international law + enforcement mechanism to achieve this
Change laws on patents by monopoly large agricultural firms for hybrid seeds, pesticides, etc.
Provide incentives and subsidies for measures that are increasing positive indicators
Price of food and stuff to include externalities, real environmental costs
Tax GHG emissions, unhealthy food
Investigate and educate on good examples of maintaining biodiversity
Raise consciousness on spiritual values of biodiversity
Bring destructive organizations to court

Action taken

Unfortunately we are not moving towards the ideal state as biodiversity threats are increasing, and biodiversity is decreasing, but there are increasing local, regional and global efforts to go in a better direction with the UN Convention on biodiversity, with a goal to increase protected areas to 30% of land and sea to be protected by 2030
But protecting lands and seas is not enough as the use of biodiversity is also related to the use (overuse) of biodiversity and related to our general consumption and production of goods, energy and services. https://www.cbd.int/abs/

Current state of the art

https://seea.un.org/sites/seea.un.org/files/documents/EEA/seea_ea_backg…
https://seea.un.org/content/accounting-biodiversity

References

Summary for Policymakers of the IPBES GLOBAL ASSESSMENT REPORT ON BIODIVERSITY AND ECOSYSTEM SERVICES https://www.ipbes.net/global-assessment

Global Biodiversity Outlook 5 https://www.cbd.int/gbo/gbo5/publication/gbo-5-spm-en.pdf

Accounting for ecosystems and their services in the European Union (INCA) — 2021 edition https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/en/web/products-statistical-reports/-/ks-…

Camilo Mora, Derek P. Tittensor, Sina Adl, Alastair G. B. Simpson, Boris Worm. How Many Species Are There on Earth and in the Ocean? PLoS Biology, 2011; 9 (8): e1001127 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pbio.1001127

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