The world’s biodiversity is in steep decline. Thousands of species are facing existential threats. Forests are dwindling. Coral reefs are dying. This puts humanity in real jeopardy. Some 1.2 billion people depend on nature to meet their basic needs, while over half the world’s GDP depends on nature.

But we are responding. Under the leadership of China, the world adopted the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF). This is our plan to protect biodiversity – and so ourselves. My thanks to China for its leadership and for partnering with UNEP to launch the Kunming Biodiversity Fund today.

This new fund, which China and UNEP will co-chair, is crucial because a plan is only as good as its implementation, and implementation can only happen with sufficient resources.

To bring the biggest impact, we need a whole of society, whole of government approach. The Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity and the UN Development Programme are already founding UN partners. The fund is open to all UN agencies to join in supporting developing countries to deliver on a sustainable future for people and nature. UNEP – as co-chair of the fund and host to many biodiversity, chemicals and regional seas conventions – is working to harmonize action on protecting nature.

We must involve the people who live with and use nature, and ensure they benefit equitably from its sustainable use. And we need meaningful action across key sectors, particularly food and agriculture and extractive industries. We all depend on nature, so I invite public and private partners to grow the fund.

Investing in nature, through the GBF and this Fund, is a smart economic decision. Nature is the green engine that drives our economies. If we don’t maintain it, the engine will die. But if we use it sustainably and equitably, the engine will carry all of humanity towards a better future.

Originally published on www.unep.org

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