The European Union (EU) will devote more than €350 million per year to the protection of biodiversity around the world, and in particular in Africa. This funding will be provided through programmes that focus directly on biodiversity and programmes that aim to integrate biodiversity into other sectors, including CSR (corporate social responsibility) policies and the sustainability of value chains.
According to EU figures, biodiversity in Africa has declined by an alarming 65% since 1970. This is largely due to the increasing demand for natural resources to support a growing population and unsustainable global patterns of consumption and production that lead to widespread habitat loss, overexploitation of species, invasive species and disease.
At the same time, the African biodiversity conservation sector is suffering from a funding gap. This amounts to between $598 billion and $824 billion per year, or between 80 and 85% of what is needed, according to Credit Suisse, a Zurich-based banking group.
The EU towards COP 15 on biodiversity
The EU’s financial commitment is part of its deployment to the United Nations Conference on Biodiversity (COP 15), which takes place from 7 to 19 December 2022 in Montreal, Canada. For the EU, this is an opportunity for world leaders to act to protect “the increasingly endangered planet”.
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The nearly 196 countries expected to attend COP 15 will try to agree on a global framework to halt and reverse biodiversity loss by 2030. As part of the proposed global biodiversity framework, African negotiators are expressing a need for funding of between $100 billion and $700 billion a year to protect the continent’s biodiversity.
Boris Ngounou