Answering the call to protect our environment

The United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity, which promotes sustainable development while considering ecosystems, was signed at the 1992 Earth Summit and recently held its 16th Conference of the Parties (COP 16) in October 2024 in Cali, Colombia. Stakeholders gathered to see the progress on the Kunming-Montreal commitments, which set goals and targets for 2030 and aims to reverse nature loss by 2050. This was the first COP open to wide civil society participation, prompting a symbiosis of generations, ethnicities, leaders, scientists, artists, activists, journalists and organizations who delivered key messages on what is at stake and the urgency to act.

I attended on behalf of Alongside Hope, which has supported global sustainable development and environmental care, with Colombian partners who protect biodiversity in the Moorlands-Pàramos and Amazon rainforest. Various organizations participated through media coverage, conferences, workshops, and training sessions. They promoted environmental protection, sustainable development, and human rights, focusing on the Amazon and Moorlands ecosystems.

Why was this event important? What is a stake?

Biodiversity includes various living things, such as seeds, soil, natural resources, people and interconnected ecosystems. An example is the symbiosis between the Pàramos, swamps, forests and jungles, where water plays a crucial role. Water, trapped by the Frailejon plant, feeds streams, forests, and swamps, regulating flooding and supporting life. However, climate change disrupts water cycles, causing droughts, scarcity and flooding. This inherent link between climate change and biodiversity loss prompted a COP resolution.

The Pàramos of Colombia, Ecuador and Peru are vital water reservoirs and carbon sinks, and the Amazon rainforest, known as the “lungs of the world,” is facing significant threats. These biodiversity hotspots, crucial to the delicate rainforest-Pàramos water cycle, are being endangered by human activities such as mining, cattle ranching and agriculture, ultimately driven by greed. The Amazon, home to more than 400 Indigenous groups, has been preserved undoubtedly, by Indigenous people’s way of living. “Amazonian people have lived in the middle of the forests, a healthy life, in coexistence with nature, we are not primitive, as Westerners say, we are wise. Living there is hard and requires strength and health. There, we are born free; in the western world, from the moment a child is born, it is born in debt,” said one Indigenous participant from the Amazon.

To protect the planet’s biodiversity, we need shared efforts from all actors, particularly the inclusion of ethnic communities in policy and strategy. A small but significant win was the launch of the global “World Peace with Nature” coalition. Recognizing ethnic communities’ traditional knowledge and local media is essential in biodiversity protection. However, Indigenous leaders, women, activities, scientists and environmental defenders continue to face threats and violence. We must protect defenders and improve their working conditions. This can be achieved by enhancing internet access, rebuilding local communication networks, and raising awareness about socio-environmental conflicts.

The COP confirmed the world is not acting fast enough; countries are not on track to protect 30% of the world’s land and water by 2030. Why?

Financial resources are paramount but also lacking. Countries that developed great wealth exploiting other countries’ natural resources must repair the damages caused. Initiatives like Visión Amazonia, a deforestation containment program, show how international cooperation can support the preservation of Indigenous territories. However, biodiversity financial strategies, such as economic incentives for environmental services or conservation, and carbon market bonds addressing emissions’ cap overpass, received strong criticism. Companies look to negotiate privately, without communities’ consultation, ignoring top leaders and breaking the social fabric.

Four Amazon Indigenous Nations won a case against a large financial initiative, demanding environmental justice with local mechanisms, participation and respect for sovereignty with protection of ancestral rights and knowledge, and no monetary value. Good decisions include companies that profit from genetic biodiversity resources, which will fund the “Cali Fund.”

Second, laws must enforce corporate accountability for biodiversity damage. Inhabitants of jungles, forests, rivers and lakes blame excessive industrialization – agri-business, resource extraction, particularly by foreign companies, and pollution – for the massive biodiversity loss. The advance of foreign mining, by many Canadian companies, in the Pàramos and the Amazon is aggressive.

We are familiar with climate change effects such as wildfires, droughts and floods, triggering biodiversity loss, but we are far from what Indigenous peoples and peasantry in the “south” experience. Their homes are under attack. Their lives, and our lives, are at stake.