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https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/nov/03/we-are-in-danger-of-forgetting-what-the-climate-crisis-means-extinction>
"You may have heard of Cop29, the global climate change conference that doesn’t
start until 11 November but has already been generating headlines for weeks.
You are less likely to have heard of Cop16, the international summit on
biodiversity. It wrapped up two days ago but has barely scraped the news
agenda.
The lack of interest in Cop16 extended even to the participants. A whopping 80%
of countries failed to submit plans for meeting a landmark UN nature agreement
at the conference, as they had promised to do. Even Colombia, which hosted
Cop16, missed the deadline. And, as the summit wore on, representatives noticed
with mounting alarm a “lack of concrete progress” on any of the major targets
they had set themselves.
It’s not as if the mass depletion of nature isn’t an urgent problem. Since
1970, wildlife populations have declined on average by 73%. Since 2015, we have
lost a number of species forever: the golden toad, the Pinta giant tortoise,
the mountain mist frog, several bats and birds. We heard at Cop16 that 46,000
species face extinction, including more than a third of the planet’s trees.
But as woods empty of wildlife, coral reefs ossify and the wind howls through
wastelands that used to be rainforests, the focus of governments,
environmentalists and industry has become lopsided. Climate change sucks up all
the attention. Nature loss loses. The world has never met a single target to
stem the destruction of wildlife.
Contrast, for example, the politics of the two Cops in Britain. When in 2022
the prime minister, Rishi Sunak, announced that he would not be attending
Cop27, a public backlash forced him to change his mind. Another outcry followed
his progress at Cop28, at which he deigned to appear for the span of half a
day. But there is next to no pressure for prime ministers to turn up at the
biodiversity conference. This time Britain was represented by a “nature envoy”,
appointed to the role – hastily perhaps – just one day before Cop16 started.
The trend stretches back decades. It can be traced, I think, to the 1980s and
early 1990s, when environmental movements shifted priorities. They largely
stopped talking about saving whales, pandas or the rainforests, and started
talking about degrees in temperature. “Global warming” – now “climate change” –
became the headline message. The shift continues. There is up to eight times
more media coverage of the climate crisis than of biodiversity loss. Are we
making the right choice here? Does this matter? You could argue that the
problems are so closely linked that it doesn’t. As the planet warms, scientists
predict a series of “extinction cliffs”, where a small change in temperature
will wipe out entire ecosystems: we can’t save the animals without dealing with
the warming planet. But then you can’t halt climate change without the help of
nature, either. Forests, wetlands and oceans absorb carbon dioxide from the
atmosphere. Trees reduce flooding and cool the surrounding areas. Lose them,
and we lose the fight.
But here’s the main problem with the narrow focus on degrees in temperature
that characterises the way we now talk about saving the planet: it is clean and
precise, but it’s also far too abstract."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
