The Ministry of Environment, Nature Protection and Sustainable Development, MINEPDED, alongside its partners have officially launch the BIODEV2030 project aimed at safeguarding world’s biodiversity via a multi-stakeholder approach.
The launching ceremony took place November 12, in Yaounde, in the presence of the representatives of the French Development Agency, AFD, the World Wide Fund, WWF and Expertise France.
Within a context marked by a 68% decline in biodiversity around the globe between 1970 and 2016, the planet will experience a lost of over one million plants and animal species threatened with extinction over the next decade if nothing is being done.
Thus, the BIODEV2030 Project that is funded by the French Development Agency, coordinated by Expertise France, facilitated by the World Wide Fund and the International Union for Conservation of Nature will however be implemented by the 16 African countries of which Cameroon is a member.
The project that is financed at €10 million for all the 16 countries concerned will have contribution from the sectoral administrations in a bid to reverse the decline of this biodiversity by 2030 and fully restoring it come 2050.
In order to attain this, the process irreversibly requires an international dialogue between all major stakeholders of the 16 pilot countries to exchange experiences on good practices to support the various states in integrating biodiversity into their sustainable development paths.
Therefore, there is need to bend the curve of biodiversity by 2030 given that it was ranked amongst the first-five threats to the world. However, more than 50 percent of the world’s Gross Domestic Product, GDP, is greatly dependent on the ecosystem, reason for advocating for a healthier ecosystem.
It was revealed that, 20 percent of countries in the world are at high risk of collapsing should the ecosystem collapses. This will go a long way to affecting the world’s economy and wealth.
According to Gilles Etoga, Acting Conservation Director of WWF Cameroon, there are three approaches to attaining biodiversity ambition by 2030, which are the global strategies behind the BIODEV2030 project. “The first one is the diagnostic, the second if dialogue and the third one is dissemination. Why do we need to make a diagnostic? Because we want to collect scientific data that prove and that will support our campaign on the 2030 biodiversity programme.”
He added that, “we are guessing for the moment the sector that is impacting most the biodiversity but we need to have scientific data to sustain it so that, when we will discuss and engage on the second step which is dialogue, we should come to the table with scientific prices at hand.”
Also, Gilles Etoga said with respect to the third step, they will probably have a common understanding and agreement on how to tackle biodiversity laws in a way that the curve will be bent by 2030. To him, they will equally disseminate the results gotten from the dialogue during the third step.
On his part, Nana Aboubakar Diallo, Minister Delegate at the MINEPDED highlighted that, the ever degrading ecosystem is due to excess exploitation of natural resources which is accentuated by climate change and diverse pollutions, reason why efforts need to doubled with regards to preserving a healthy biodiversity.
“This project requires the integration of biodiversity in the economic and social projects of our country and others so as to conciliate the protection of biodiversity, nature protection and development because development is indispensable,” said the Minister Delegate.
That said, the global objective of the project launched in Cameroon’s capital city Yaounde is to assist the government in identifying stakeholders either from the private sector or Civil Society Organisations, CSOs, so as to establish a platform for dialogue for all actors concerned in the protection of the biodiversity, nature protection with the aim to conciliator economic and social development.
Key activities to be implemented by the project include; assessing the threats to biodiversity at the national level and estimating potential threat reduction measures of at least two key economic sectors in Cameroon. The project will facilitate multi-stakeholder dialogues to share a common vision and set voluntary commitments involving key economic sectors, to support national commitments for the Post-2020 Agenda for a more ambitious global biodiversity framework.
Lessons from the project will be disseminated through experience sharing and discussions at international forums such as the IUCN World Conservation Congress in Marseille (France) and at Convention for Biological Diversity (CBD) COP15 in 2021.
The project is being launched at a time biodiversity is facing serious threats. According to WWF 2020 Living Report, stopping biodiversity decline and preserving ecosystems are urgently needed if we want to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals by 2050. BIODEV2030