This proven strategy can reverse biodiversity loss and boost economies

Biodiversity is declining faster than at any other time in history, with successive major reports highlighting the huge scale of nature loss. In fact, 1 million plant and animal species are threatened with extinction, many within the next few decades. To halt and reverse these catastrophic trends, it is essential that the root drivers of biodiversity loss are addressed – especially as doing so also brings opportunities and benefits including enhancing human health and wellbeing and creating green jobs.

The way natural resources (land, biomass, fossil fuels, metals, minerals, and water) are managed, particularly biomass and land, has a big impact on the largest drivers of biodiversity loss: habitat destruction, overextraction, pollution, and climate change.

The International Resource Panel (IRP), hosted by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), is focused on the relationship between natural resource use and global challenges like climate change and biodiversity loss. The IRP’s latest think-piece (or whitepaper) outlines how implementing natural resource management principles can build biodiversity, and highlights examples of how they are already delivering for nature in a whole range of different contexts.

Know your impact

Value chain transparency enables decision-makers to identify key points of intervention, where environmental impacts along the value chain caused by production and consumption can be reduced. Ideally, value chain transparency would be made a reality through strong scientific data and consistent international standards. These incentivize producers to invest in traceability – knowing that the resulting transparency would be accepted by any country they wanted to import to. Technology, policy and finance are helping to improve this transparency.

Technology: Technology is already improving transparency. For instance, chocolate producers Barry Callebaut are using satellite services to trace the origins of cocoa in chocolate supply chains. This information reduces the drivers of deforestation directly or indirectly associated with their supply of cocoa.

Policy: Governments are also driving value chain transparency: for example, the German Federal Government intends to pass a supply chain act this year, requiring companies to meet due diligence standards on human rights and environmental impacts.
Source: World Economic Forum