Biodiversity and Climate Change
The Conference of the
Parties
1.
Welcomes the report of the Ad Hoc Technical Expert Group on
Biological Diversity and Climate Change (UNEP/CBD/SBSTTA/9/11 and
UNEP/CBD/SBSTTA/9/INF/12) as scientific advice provided in response
to paragraphs 11 and 18 of decision V/4, as a basis for future
work;
2.
Invites Parties, other Governments, international
organizations and other bodies to make use of the report on climate
change and biodiversity prepared by the Ad Hoc Technical Expert
Group on Biological Diversity and Climate Change in order to
promote synergies at the national level between the United Nations
Framework Convention on Climate Change and its Kyoto Protocol and
the Convention on Biological Diversity, when implementing
climate-change activities and their relation to the conservation
and sustainable use of biodiversity;
3.
Invites the national focal points for the Convention on
Biological Diversity to bring the report to the attention of their
counterpart focal points for the United Nations Framework
Convention on Climate Change, and for other relevant agreements, in
order to promote synergy at national level;
4.
Notes with appreciation that the Subsidiary Body on
Scientific and Technical Advice of the United Nations Framework
Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) has welcomed the report of
the Ad Hoc Technical Expert Group and has encouraged Parties to the
UNFCCC to make use of it for their national purposes as a
relevant source of useful information for their national
purposes;
5.
Notes that the Conference of the Parties to the Ramsar
Convention on Wetlands at its eighth meeting adopted resolution
VIII/3 on climate change and wetlands, which, inter alia,
called on relevant countries to take action to minimize the
degradation as well as promote the restoration. of those peatlands
and other wetland types that are significant carbon stores or have
the ability to sequester carbon and supports the request by
the Parties to the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands to the
InterGovernmental Panel on Climate Change to prepare a technical
paper on the relationship between wetlands and climate
change;
6.
Welcomes the
proposed assessment on peatlands biodiversity and climate change
being undertaken by Wetlands International and the Global
Environment Center with the support of UNEP-GEF, the Government of
Canada, the Netherlands and others and encourages the
involvement of parties in this assessment and in preparations for
the consideration of its findings by SBSTTA prior to the ninth
meeting of the Conference of the Parties.
7.
Notes also that there are opportunities to implement climate
change mitigation and adaptation activities in ways that are
mutually beneficial and synergistic, and that contribute
simultaneously to the United Nations Framework Convention on
Climate Change and its Kyoto Protocol, the Convention on Biological
Diversity, the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification,
Vienna Convention for the Protection of the Ozone Layer and its
Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer, the
Ramsar Convention on Wetlands, and other international agreements,
all within broader national development objectives;
8.
Further notes that the ecosystem approach provides a
framework for the integrated management of land, water and living
resources. Its application could facilitate the formulation of
climate change mitigation and adaptation projects that also
contribute to biodiversity conservation and sustainable use at the
national level;
9.
Invites Parties, other Governments, international
organizations and other bodies to facilitate building capacity
related to accessing information and tools, and for enhancing
coordination at national level to ensure that climate change
mitigation and adaptation projects deliver environmental and social
benefits and are consistent with national priorities.
10. Calls
for where national circumstances allow case-studies on
interlinkages between biodiversity and climate change following a
common format developed by the joint liaison group;
11.
Invites Parties, Governments, funding agencies, research
bodies and other organizations to address the gaps identified in
the Report in order to help to optimize biodiversity conservation
and sustainable use within climate change adaptation projects, as
well as mitigation projects addressing the adverse effects of human
activities over the long term at the national, regional, and global
levels;
12.
Encourages Parties to take measures to manage ecosystems so
as to maintain their resilience extreme climate events and to help
mitigate and adapt to climate change;
13.
Requests the Subsidiary Body on Scientific, Technical and
Technological Advice, with the support of the Executive Secretary,
to ensure that the results of the report on climate change and
biodiversity prepared by the Ad Hoc Technical Expert Group are
incorporated into the ongoing work of the Convention on Biological
Diversity, whenever appropriate, when the respective programmes of
work are due for review according to the Multi Year Programme of
Work of the Conference of the Parties (decision VII/31)and in
particular, in the programmes of work on forest biodiversity,
marine and coastal biodiversity, mountain biodiversity, inland
water biodiversity, biodiversity of dry and sub-humid lands,
agricultural biodiversity, indicators, impact assessment, and
incentive measures, without implying obligations on Parties
additional to those under the Convention on Biological
Diversity;
14.
Requests the Subsidiary Body on Scientific, Technical and
Technological Advice, as the next stage of its work on the
interlinkages between biodiversity and climate change to develop,
for the consideration of the Conference of the Parties, advice or
guidance for promoting synergy among activities to address climate
change at the national, regional and international level where
appropriate, including activities to combat desertification and
land degradation, and activities for the conservation and
sustainable use of biodiversity;
15.
Invites the conferences of the parties to the United Nations
Framework Convention on Climate Change and the United Nations
Convention to Combat Desertification to collaborate with the
Convention on Biological Diversity, through the joint liaison group
as appropriate, in the development of advice or guidance to Parties
in implementing activities that are mutually supportive of the
objectives of the three conventions at the local, sub-national, and
national levels; and to involve biodiversity experts in relevant
activities of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate
Change, including methodological issues;
16.
Invites the InterGovernmental Panel on Climate Change,
inter alia through its Fourth Assessment Report, to continue
its work on the relationship between climate change and
biodiversity including the detection and attribution to climate
change of observed biodiversity losses, taking into account the
target adopted by decision VI/26 of the Conference of the Parties
to achieve by 2010 a significant reduction of the current rate of
biodiversity loss at the global, regional and national
levels;
17.
Further invites the InterGovernmental Panel on Climate
Change and the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment to collaborate with
the Subsidiary Body on Scientific, Technical and Technological
Advice on the use of scenarios addressing biodiversity changes in
relation to climate change;
18.
Invites sources of funding to provide financial support to
developing country Parties, in particular the least developed and
small island developing States among them, and countries with
economies in transition, where appropriate, for:
(a)
Country-driven activities, including pilot projects, aimed at
projects related to ecosystem conservation, restoration of degraded
lands and marine environments and overall ecosystem integrity that
take into account impacts of climate change;
(b)
Assistance in capacity-building with the aim of increasing the
effectiveness in addressing environmental issues through their
commitments under the Convention on Biological Diversity, the
United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, and the
United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification, inter alia by applying the ecosystem
approach;
(c)
Assistance in developing synergy-oriented programmes to conserve
and sustainably manage all ecosystems, such as forests, wetlands
and marine environments that also contribute to poverty
eradication;
19. Notes that the
report of the Ad Hoc Technical Expert Group has been transmitted to
the Secretariat of the United Nations Framework Convention on
Climate Change and through the Secretariat to its bodies, and
requests the Executive Secretary to transmit the report of
the Ad Hoc Technical Expert Group also to the secretariats of the
Convention to Combat Desertification, the Ramsar Convention, the
Vienna Convention for the Protection of the Ozone Layer and its
Montreal Protocol, the InterGovernmental Panel on Climate Change,
the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, the Convention on Migratory
Species, the United Nations Development Programme, the Global
Environment Facility, and the United Nations Forum on Forests, the
World Heritage Convention and the Man and the Biosphere programme
of UNESCO, as well as relevant organizations and bodies including,
inter alia, other members of the Collaborative Partnership
on Forests, IUCN, and the World Wide Fund for Nature;
20. Further
requests the Executive Secretary, in preparation for the
next stage of the work on climate change and biodiversity by the
Subsidiary Body on Scientific, Technical and Technological Advice,
gather in collaboration with, the InterGovernmental Panel on
Climate Change, and other relevant organizations, within their
given mandates, relevant material for promoting synergy between
climate-change mitigation and adaptation activities and the
conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity, drawing
upon:
(a) Case-studies,
contributed by Parties and others, illustrating the potential of
biodiversity both to mitigate and adapt to global climate change,
and lessons from these experiences, including lessons learned from
extreme climate events;
(b) Existing
relevant tools, approaches and processes for designing projects,
and evaluating their economic, environmental and social
implications, related to mitigating or adapting to climate change
within the broader context of sustainable development both at the
national and regional level.
