The Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) have produced a new report examining the nexus between climate change and biodiversity loss. IUCN Urban Alliance’s Eline van Remorel reports.
It is widely recognised that climate change and biodiversity are deeply interconnected, yet in practice, they tend to be addressed separately. This is problematic. Narrowly focused solutions addressing just one of the two, may directly or indirectly exacerbate the other, or fail to take full advantage of potential synergies. In light of this complexity, IPBES and IPCC organised a joint workshop in the UK from 14 to 17 December 2020 to explore the connections between climate and biodiversity. It marks the first-ever joint collaboration between the two intergovernmental bodies. The official workshop report presented a set of 41 conclusions (Pörtner et al., 2021), of which the following ten strongly pertain to the urban context.
1. Increasing consumption, overexploitation of natural resources, and transformation of natural areas that mainly take place in and around cities have supported better living standards but have also led to an accelerated decline in biological diversity and an increase in greenhouse gas emissions.
2. Climate change and biodiversity loss reinforce each other. Impacts of climate change – such as flooding or extreme heat events – hit the hardest where ecosystems have been compromised. Greenhouse gas emissions increase where biodiversity collapses. Resolving either issue requires consideration of the other.
3. Ecosystems that are close to their tolerance limits, such as those affected by urban sprawl or pollution, are especially vulnerable to climate change. Robust interventions are needed to enhance the adaptive capacity of these ecosystems.
4. Nature-based Solutions can play an important role in restoring natural and modified ecosystems such as cities to create co-benefits for climate mitigation and adaptation as well as species conservation.
5. Avoiding and reversing the loss and degradation of species- and carbon-rich species is of the highest importance for combined biodiversity protection and climate change mitigation.
6. The creation of green infrastructure in cities is increasingly being used for climate adaptation and mitigation and the restoration of biodiversity. Positive effects include the reduction of the urban heat island effect, carbon sequestration, and storage in urban trees.
7. Actions undertaken for climate mitigation and regreening such as afforestation, especially monogamous on a large scale, can be detrimental to biodiversity. Mitigating and regreening efforts should therefore be executed in coordination with local ecosystems.
8. Restoring and conserving nature is an important instrument to address biodiversity loss, with climate mitigation and adaptation co-benefits.
9. Assessing the range of viable solutions to achieve climate mitigation, adaptation, and biodiversity conservation outcomes, while contributing to people’s quality of life requires recognition of contexts and their socio-ecological differences.
10. Multi-actor and multi-scale governance is crucial for the implementation of climate, biodiversity, and sustainable development. The need for rapid action and transformative change argues for governance structures to embrace more collaborative solutions.
The interrelation between climate change and biodiversity loss is unquestionable. Urban areas are located right in the midst of this nexus as they are a driver of negative impacts and, at the same time, suffer from the effects of climate change and biodiversity loss. In this position, urban areas can play a crucial role in addressing the challenges and opportunities arising from the climate-biodiversity nexus.
Read more about the IPCC-IPBES workshop outcomes on https://bit.ly/3FbQ8Lf
References:
Pörtner, H.O., Scholes, R.J., Agard, J., Archer, E., Arneth, A., Bai, X., Barnes, D., Burrows, M., Chan, L., Cheung, W.L., Diamond, S., Donatti, C., Duarte, C., Eisenhauer, N., Foden, W., Gasalla, M. A., Handa, C., Hickler, T., Hoegh-Guldberg, O., Ichii, K., Jacob, U., Insarov, G., Kiessling, W., Leadley, P., Leemans, R., Levin, L., Lim, M., Maharaj, S., Managi, S., Marquet, P. A., McElwee, P., Midgley, G., Oberdorff, T., Obura, D., Osman, E., Pandit, R., Pascual, U., Pires, A. P. F., Popp, A., Reyes-García, V., Sankaran, M., Settele, J., Shin, Y. J., Sintayehu, D. W., Smith, P., Steiner, N., Strassburg, B., Sukumar, R., Trisos, C., Val, A.L., Wu, J., Aldrian, E., Parmesan, C., Pichs-Madruga, R., Roberts, D.C., Rogers, A.D., Díaz, S., Fischer, M., Hashimoto, S., Lavorel, S., Wu, N., Ngo, H.T. (2021). IPBES-IPCC co-sponsored workshop report on biodiversity and climate change; IPBES and IPCC