Biodiversity 2050: Can the convention on biological diversity deliver a world living in harmony with nature?

• Main Author: LIM, Michelle Mei Ling
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University 2021
• Subjects: Biodiversity; sustainability; Convention on Biological Diversity; assessment; Environmental Law
• Online Access: https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/sol_research/4086; https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/context/sol_research/article/6044/viewcontent/Biodiversity_2050_sv.pdf
• Institution: Singapore Management University

The Convention on Biological Diversity’s (CBD) ‘2050 Vision’ aims to achieve, by 2050, a world that is ‘living in harmony with nature.’ Yet biodiversity is threatened globally to an extent never before witnessed in human history. The Global Assessment of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES Global Assessment)—the largest ever assessment of the global state of biodiversity and ecosystems services—found that a sustainable global future for people and nature remains possible. However, this can only be achieved if we fundamentally redesign our economic, social, and governance systems. It is almost three decades since the CBD, the overarching global legal instrument for biodiversity, came into force. Our planet’s economic, social, and environmental systems are far more connected than they were in the world into which the CBD was born. Meanwhile, the threats to biodiversity are far more apparent, the need for its protection far more urgent. Today, we sit on the brink of the possible realization of a significant shift in the operation of the convention.