Slow Food Calls on Political Leaders to Save Biodiversity

On World Biodiversity Day (May 22), Slow Food published a policy brief on biodiversity, outlining its dramatic decline and the urgent need for the international community to step up its efforts to save this vital resource for the future of humankind.

National governments will meet next June to refine their global biodiversity framework ahead of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) that will take place in Kunming, China, later this year.

Biodiversity underpins our food, from plant varieties to animal breeds, beneficial insects, microorganisms and ecosystems, as does the diversity of human knowledge and cultures. We need biodiversity everywhere: our seas, our soil, our food, our body, our flowers etc. This is why acknowledging the importance of biodiversity is critical to ensure food security, sustainable development and the supply of vital ecosystem services.

The UNCBD is often referred to as the biodiversity equivalent of the climate talks, with the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework being nicknamed “the Paris Agreement for Biodiversity”. It will be followed by negotiations in the third quarter of 2022 in Kunming, China. The adoption of the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework should provide a strategic vision and a global roadmap for the conservation, restoration and sustainable management of biodiversity over the next decade.

“We will not have an effective Global Biodiversity Framework if international institutions and national governments do not include the recognition and promotion of agroecological food systems to prevent the collapse of biodiversity and mitigate the climate crisis,” Edie Mukiibi, Vice President of Slow Food.

“Agroecological farmers must be granted institutional and political recognition, while farmers must be supported in the transition towards agroecology. This can happen in a number of ways, from improving advisory services, training opportunities and exchanges between farmers, and by giving financial assistance wherever possible. The CBD should also acknowledge indigenous peoples’ key role as guardians of 80% of the world’s biodiversity”, Mubiki adds.

In our policy brief, we advocate for public money for public goods: only agroecological farming systems contributing to the socio-cultural, economic and environmental sustainability of their local areas should receive financial support from governments.

Moreover, the Global Biodiversity Framework must address the drivers of biodiversity loss such as:

• ever-increasing economic growth and inequality,
• industrialized food systems,
• excessive consumption levels,
• corporate capture
• the naive belief that technology will be able to fix any and all problems.

Voluntary commitments and self-regulatory initiatives should only be seen as complementary drivers and never replace binding regulations.

“We need policies which enable food environments to face the interlinked health and environmental crises, ensuring equitable regulatory frameworks to enable citizens to support biodiversity through their consumption choices,” Marta Messa, director of Slow Food Europe.

As reported by the UN Environment Programme, states and international organizations are obliged to address biodiversity loss under both international environmental law and international human rights law; they have a responsibility to prevent negative impacts on human rights resulting from its loss, and to ensure that actions to address biodiversity loss are equitable and sustainable.

Read Slow Food’s policy brief on biodiversity here.

And to learn more about the multiples dimensions of biodiversity, have a peek at Slow Food’s position paper.