Promote conservation of biodiversity based on newly adopted protocol

Japan Press Weekly

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Promote conservation of biodiversity based on newly adopted protocol - Akahata editorial

The 10th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity adopted the Nagoya Protocols, which set rules for sharing profits from the use of genetic resources and set a target date of 2020 to halve the loss of biodiversity.

After the eight-year negotiations, 193 countries made concessions at the last minute of the conference and unanimously approved the legal-binding protocol. The form of international cooperation created here will hopefully be exercised at the negotiations on global warming, which are facing difficulties at present.

For fair distribution of profits

Negotiations on the use of and distribution of benefits from genetic resources, which continued until the last moment, affected the course of the whole conference, including the adoption of the target for conserving ecosystems.

The new rule is to drastically change the way to use natural resources from plundering to fair sharing of profits arising from them. Developing countries, making up the vast majority of the parties, presented influential arguments counteracting arguments by developed countries representing corporate profits.

The Nagoya Protocol was based on a draft submitted by Japan on the last day of the conference. It did not reflect developing nations’ demands that a new rule be applied to the profits they could have received in the past and that information on the use of genetic materials be released. As a result, the adopted protocol was partly viewed as siding with developed countries and their corporations using technologies developed out of such materials.

Although the draft included financial assistance to developing nations in order to achieve consensus, how such support will be provided is ambiguous. The same thing can be said as to how to share profits from the use of genetic resources and how to monitor the compliance of laws imposed in a country where such resources are procured.

The target set to conserve ecosystems has been put forward as effective and urgent measures to halt the loss of biological diversity. However, land areas under protection share only 17 percent and sea areas, 10 percent, in the target. These figures are merely the result of a compromise of contending claims, and are inadequate to prevent the decline in biodiversity.

Members to the Convention are required to take measures in excess of the set goals. Measures related to the Ramsar Convention to preserve marshlands are also important, and it may be necessary to set higher goals.

Being hostile to the increasing voices of developing countries over resources as a likely restriction on U.S. corporate activities in biotechnology and other sectors, the United States has turned its back on the world trend and chose not to join the biodiversity convention. The establishment of international rules with a binding force over utilizing resources may have disadvantageous effects on countries not participating in the convention. The United States should join the protocol and fulfill its due responsibility.

Big responsibility for Japan

The negotiations having reached a settlement is the start of a new phase. The loss of biological diversity has been accelerated, along with the ongoing pace of global warming. Effective measures are urgently needed.

The Japanese government as the host nation and coordinator of negotiations has a major responsibility to exert efforts for conserving biological diversity. The government itself must put a brake on land development and public works projects which are destructive to ecosystems and the nation’s agriculture. It is unacceptable to construct a new U.S. base by damaging the life-rich sea in Okinawa, the habitat of the endangered mammal dugong. It is also an urgent task of the government to review the land reclamation project by partly draining Isahaya Bay in Kyushu which has resulted in damage to bluespotted mud hoppers and fan shells.

-Akahata, November1, 2010