12 December 2022, Montreal Canada – Action to implement Nature-based Solutions (NbS) can enhance biodiversity conservation in the Pacific region when communities understand, and are engaged to work with, local and national governments, partners and donors to plan and implement them.
On the sidelines of the 15th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (COP15) in Montreal Canada, the Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP) and the Kiwa Secretariat, AFD, SPC and IUCN-ORO, convened a panel discussion on how local experiences and approaches to working with nature can build the resilience of Pacific communities to climate change. The event titled “Reimagining conservation and human rights” was held at the IUCN Nature Positive Pavilion at the Palais des Congrès on Saturday where negotiations to finalise a Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework continues.
“We cannot do good projects on nature-based solutions, or any type of project for that matter, without the involvement of communities, we need to work closely with local communities,” said Mr Guillaume Chiron, the Deputy Director, Agriculture, Rural Development and Biodiversity Division, Agence Française de Développement (AFD).
“We have to bridge local and national priorities. If we do activities that are not in line with national priorities, I don’t think it will work, the same thing will happen if we don’t work closely with local communities. That means we must understand the situation in different countries and listen to their needs.”
Mr Chiron was among diverse stakeholders including Kiwa partners, beneficiaries and donors who featured on the panel, moderated by Ms Anne-Claire Goarant, Climate Change and Environmental Sustainability Manager, of The Pacific Community.
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The Director, Environment and Conservation Division, Ministry of Environment, Lands & Agricultural Development of Kiribati, Ms Nenenteiti Teariki-Ruatau, said her country welcomes the opportunity to benefit from NbS that are gender-sensitive, socially inclusive and incorporate human rights but she said it is going to take time.
“Coming from a small island country, with limited resources and limited capacity, we are only starting to talk about nature-based solutions although we’ve been doing it as part of ecosystem-based approach for some time. Some of the soft measures we’ve been taking include approaches to address coastal erosion challenges in our Pacific countries,” she said. “But it’s important that we understand the nuances of NbS at these international MEAs and the impacts on our communities. We need to understand the meaning, the application, and build the capacity of our people to know how it works because these things come in a package and right now, we are a long way from completely understanding this.”
Ms Teariki Ruatau agrees that community involvement is key but she sees the opportunity to be engaged in the COP15 negotiations in Montreal as an important part of that process.
“We have to take this back to our communities and really work with them but we need to understand how the international definition on NbS is really going to be applied to the work we are doing on the ground to address biodiversity and climate change. That is very critical for us and we are here to really try to understand,” she said. “We must have our own definition because the context is very different, most importantly how do we do that at the country level taking into the decisions we are here in Montreal to try and negotiate. There are different circumstances for every country.”
SPREP Coastal and Marine Ecosystems Adviser, Dr Peter Davies, highlighted the importance, relevance and the benefits of nature-based solutions in terms of human rights, gender equality, and social inclusion.
“The UN Declaration of Human Rights says people have a right to food, shelter, water and so forth. Nature-based solutions can offer all these in a changing world and in the face of climate change and biodiversity loss,” he said.
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“SPREP is working to consult and learn from Pacific communities because their approach to doing this is culturally unique and we can’t necessarily impose a global model on communities who have their own way of doing things. The key thing is that we learn from the Pacific communities on how they want to implement these things.”
Kiwa Initiative Coordinator, IUCN Oceania Regional Office, Mr Etika Qica, shared some insights working with Pacific communities.
“What we are learning through the Kiwa initiative is that all these local projects have to have an Environmental and Social Management System (ESMS) as part of the design of the project,” he said. “It is a learning process for us, as well as project implementers that the safeguards for human rights and gender is not something that will automatically happen, it has be designed as part of project planning. We have to run awareness training for our communities on what it means, for project managers and for all the projects we are working with.”
The views were supported by Program Manager for Conservation and Protected Areas, Palau Conservation Society, Ms Lolita Gibbons, who also shared her experiences during the discussion.
At COP15, nature-based solutions is a key part of the conversation around the global goal for nature, which defines what is needed to halt and reverse the current catastrophic loss of nature. It is supported by a number of organisations that ask governments to adopt the goal at the international level, which each country, the private sector, communities and others can contribute to achieving. A global goal for nature embraced at the highest levels will drive ambition in governments, business and society, to inspire the UN Convention on Biological Diversity post-2020 framework process, as well as create the opportunity for links between biodiversity and other conventions/agreements on climate, ocean and land degradation.
Ms Catherine Potvin, Deputy Director, Global Programmes, Environment Division for Global Affairs Canada, said her nation as the COP15 host country wants to ensure negotiations end with a Global Biodiversity Framework that is gender-sensitive, socially inclusive, human rights-based and incorporates NbS.
“Human rights is very important in everything that we do, from the planning to the monitoring and reporting. We start with recognising that women must be at the centre of initiatives as they play an absolutely vital role in conservation and the relationship with biodiversity and that they are custodians of practises and very precious knowledge,” she said. “We also look for partners who consider women and children as being active participants in the projects and activities. The Kiwa Initiative is a very concrete project that aligns with those values.”
The Kiwa Initiative – Nature-based Solutions (NbS) for climate resilience aims to strengthen the climate resilience of ecosystems, communities, and economies in the Pacific islands by using NbS to protect, restore, and sustainably manage biodiversity. It provides local or national authorities, civil society, and regional organizations in the Pacific island countries and territories with simplified access to funding for climate change adaptation and biodiversity conservation.
The Initiative is funded by the European Union, Agence Française de Développement (AFD), Global Affairs Canada (GAC), the Australian Government Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT), and the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT). It has established partnerships with the Pacific Community (SPC), the Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP), and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Oceania regional office. For more information: www.kiwainitiative.org
The Fifteenth Conference of the Parties to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD COP15) is held in Montreal, Canada from 7 – 19 December 2022. Chaired by the Government of China, the CBD COP15 will result in a new Global Biodiversity Framework that will continue the 2020 Biodiversity Targets with the global goal of halting biodiversity loss.
Fourteen Pacific Islands countries are Party to the CBD. They are contributing to a unified One Pacific Voice on collective issues at COP15. The countries present in Montreal are the Cook Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, Fiji, Kiribati, Niue, Nauru, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Republic of the Marshall Islands, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu.
Led by the Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP), support to Pacific island countries has been implemented with technical input through the Pacific Islands Roundtable for Nature Conservation (PIRT), and includes a One Pacific approach involving support from the Office of the Pacific Ocean Commissioner, and the Pacific Community at COP15 with financial assistance from the Government of Australia and the ACP MEA Phase 3 Project funded by the European Union and the Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States for the ACP countries.
For more information on the CBD COP15 please visit: https://www.cbd.int/conferences/2021-2022 or email [email protected]