INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE OF THE PARK | HOW TO DEAL WITH NATURE’S DANGEROUS DECLINE? FROM THE IPBES ASSESSMENTS TO ACTION
Early in May 2019, most media outlets around the world published the ‘inconvenient truth’ that humans are altering Earth’s ecosystems dramatically and at an unprecedent pace, with around 1 million animal and plant species now facing extinction. The news resulted from the publication of the summary for policymakers of the Global Assessment Report on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). The report conveyed four key messages, briefly: (i) Nature and its vital contributions to people are deteriorating worldwide; (ii) Drivers of change are accelerating; (iii) Conservation and sustainability goals for 2030 and beyond may only be achieved through transformative changes across economic, social, political and technological factors; and (iv) The conservation, restoration and sustainable use of Nature require urgent and concerted efforts fostering transformative change.
This conference on biodiversity was organised to review the past and present troubles and the challenges ahead, disseminating and discussing the dramatic conclusions of the IPBES reports, while paving the way towards new and more effective approaches to deal with Nature’s dangerous declines. To meet these goals, the conference brings together world experts involved as authors in the IPBES reports, with researchers and practitioners working around the world to understand and protect our threatened biodiversity and ecosystems. An exciting programme will include presentations, debates, and the screening of a recently completed film on one of the wildest and more biodiverse regions in Portugal: the Guadiana Valley.
EXPLORING IDEAS FOR A POST-2020 BIODIVERSITY STRATEGY
The conference will be held in a period when the United Nations decade on Biodiversity (2011-2020) is coming to an end, and it is now clear that the ambitious Aichi Biodiversity Targets of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) will not be met. It will thus be an opening event for the critical year of 2020, when a number of initiatives will be organised around the world to discuss how to halt the loss of biodiversity to ensure resilient ecosystems, culminating in the Conference of the Parties to the CBD in October and the much-anticipated adoption at the global scale of the Post-2020 Biodiversity Strategy.
To stimulate discussion on this important issue, the Foundation of Serralves together with CIBIO-InBIO (Centro de Investigação em Biodiversidade e Recursos Genéticos, Universidade do Porto) and the support of EDP Biodiversity Chair, invited experienced speakers to present keynote lectures describing the challenges and opportunities regarding biodiversity conservation worldwide, building on the recent assessments published by IPBES. A number of case studies will show that is possible to turn the tide on the biodiversity crisis, namely through the development of partnerships bringing together academia and the public and private sectors. The audience will be invited to the discussions raised by the presentations, from which contributions to the Post-2020 Biodiversity Strategy are expected to emerge.
The conference is free but requires registration.
For more details and registration, please click here.