Will the COP15 30 x 30 plan work?

You might have heard about COP15. It means the 15th meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP) to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity. The meeting brought together governments from 196 countries between December 7-19, 2022 in order to approve parts of the post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework. You can read the first draft here. COP15 has been rightly described as a ‘historic moment’. One of the most substantial agreements is to protect 30% of the world’s land and sea by 2030 (the ’30 x 30′ policy). But will the COP15 30 x 30 plan work?

Anyone who knows me knows I’m an optimist. But I’m also a realist and I am doubtful the latest COP15 decision alone will make a difference other than to start to show general solidarity in leadership. The benefits of that outcome cannot be understated of course, but delegates may have missed the mark a bit when it comes to wildlife and community.

What’s missing is blunt recognition of the critical role of local people and wildlife

Let’s not forget that all current efforts to protect ecosystemsHow ecosystems function An ecosystem is a community of lifeforms that interact in such an optimal way that how ecosystems function best, is when all components (including humans and other animals) can persist and live alongside each other for the longest time possible. Ecosystems are fuelled by the energy created by plants (primary producers) that convert the Sun's heat energy More have failed abysmally. This means we are on course to a mass extinctionAnimal life hasn't existed for very long on planet Earth. In the last 500 million years, there have been five mass extinctions, defined as events that wiped out at least 75% of animal life. The Devonian mass extinction is considered to have been caused by the rise of plants on land, which polluted the oceans in the absence of animals. More which jeopardises humanity’s entire future – the very reason this ‘Conference of Parties’ was needed. A ‘business-a-usual’ approach will continue to fail us. We need a different way of thinking to avoid the mistakes of the past.

The COP15 30 x 30 plan will not achieve this without a substantial change in human values. This is needed before we can do anything else. These are encompassed by three points I introduce in my book ‘Wildlife in the Balance: Why Animals are Humanity’s Best Hope‘ and I offer some solutions in my 10-point plan, below. Before we can begin though, we have to recognise:

• First, that we are animals like any other; 
• Second, that every small action we take is potentially the most powerful contribution any creature can ever make; and 
• Third, that we can’t do this unless we surround ourselves with wildlife. 

Accepting we are animals and collectively, with other wildlife, responsible for ecosystem stability should be front and centre of the COP15 statements. This means we do not separate humans and nature. Further, every dollar spent from now forward, has to be on reintroducing and protecting wildlife, because that is the only mechanism to restore ecosystems.

Will 30 x 30 just become an offset on steroids?

There are a lot of great ideas in conservationWhy is animal conservation important? Animal conservation is important, because animals are the only mechanism to create biodiversity, which is the mechanism that creates a habitable planet for humans. Without animals, the energy from today’s plants (algae, trees, flowers etc) will eventually reach the atmosphere and ocean, much of it as carbon. The quantity of this plant-based waste is so More that are simple because they are easier to explain to people. The reality is always more complicated of course. So it would be wrong to disregard the 30% targets altogether but equally, we have to be realistic.

Governments are already putting national parks together to meet these rather arbitrary ‘thirty per cent’ targets. Australia has created one of the largest Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) in the world – the Cocos Keeling MPA. Almost no-one lives or works there. We already have nearly a fifth of land and 45% of seas protected. Yet we are still seeing biodiversityWhat is the definition of biodiversity? When we ask, what is the definition of biodiversity? It depends on what we want to do with it. The term is widely and commonly misused, leading to significant misinterpretation of the importance of how animals function on Earth and why they matter a great deal, to human survival. Here I will try to More decline because we’re exhausting its services in all the other places that we live.

The UK has added the Lake District National Park but like most national parks, this is already part of the solution that isn’t working, as it’s been largely eroded of any values.

China pushed through the COP15 deal despite objections from many African nations. But China is also land-grabbing in the South Pacific, and I wonder how long it will be, before they designate the surrounding oceans as absolute protection and remove the traditional fishing rights of coastal communities in other countries. All this while they continue industrial fishing right up to the boundaries of parks elsewhere.

I fear that the intent to restore 30% of ‘nature’ opens up to excuses for destroying the remaining 70% of it.

There is the real risk that the 30% principle is an offset policy on steroids. In the coming months and years, I fear, we’re going to see increased risk of intensive deforestation and overfishing outside of the nominally ‘protected’ areas. But these are where we live – and we need 30% of our home environment protected too.

Why do market-based mechanisms always fail?

It’s not because they can’t work but because they depend on certain critical assumptions that big businesses cannot abide.

First is, there are many instances where it’s simply not possible to compromise further. We’ve already killed three-quarters of wild animals on Earth so there is no ecosystem resilienceReferring to an ecosystem’s ability to maintain a steady stable-state. The need to build resilience is entirely anthropocentric and symptomatic of ecosystems that are damaged or declining, leading to loss of ecosystem services on which humans depend. More left. These days, any remaining land where we live, are among the best and last remnants of natural places. They are our last hope but increasingly under threat.

Secondly, uncapped growth is impossible, and growth is the raison d’être of corporations.

Offsets only work when the impacts are from very poor quality habitat. However, this isn’t how they are used. Only the most valuable ecosystems are left and now we’re trading with them. If 30 x 30 becomes more of an excuse to do that, then our efforts will fail appallingly.

Offsets can never replace functioning ecosystems – and that means ecosystems that still have important wildlife. Ecosystems that still support remnant wildlife populations are critical for our future. They must be made sacrosanct. Ecosystems that will enable the restoration of wildlife, even if animals remain absent, are equally critical. These places also have to be avoided at all cost. Because where else will we restore nature?

Why should we be sceptical about the influence of big business?

Big businesses don’t want offsets that work. Because offsets that work are simply incompatible with growth.

For 30 x 30 to work, it has to be implemented where we live. This means accepting that remaining land is often too valuable to destroy. Shareholders require growth for dividends and business managers will largely fight for compromise where there isn’t any. Here’s an article where Polly Hemming describes the criteria needed for market-based mechanisms to work, and how that’s all but impossible.

So I am sceptical about the attendance of big industry at COP15. I’m also sceptical about politicians bringing business and environmental leaders together.

Conservation happens at the grass roots and we already know how to do it. The only businesses that could be part of this are ones that have an unmitigated and permanent policy of nature restoration – and they tend to be local. They have to be led by local people and with charters that show a willingness to abandon ideas if communities oppose them.

And while the COP15 decisions provide for ‘Indigenous rights at the heart of conservation‘, what about everyone else? Again, I fear business-as-usual creeping in. As important as it is, giving money to indigenous communities is not itself a fix for environmental problems. It could easily become another excuse to stop protecting the other 70% of land where most people live. Where is the pledge to empower all communities to make their own environmental choices democratically?

Why instead, is community decision-making essential?

People need a place to live and work, to construct a place to live, get food and water. But we exploit resources from the places we don’t live. Destroying the environment outside of our cities is the reason why we have environmental problems in the first place.

In Melbourne Australia, where I live, we are deforesting remaining remnants of primary forest for paper and building materials. This is where our water comes from.

If we were to poll the community, it’s highly likely, that most people would want to protect the wildlife that regulate those life-giving ecosystems. But our society has not yet accepted (or had explained to them) the critical role of animals in ecosystems. So, we still assume wrongly that we can simply replant lost habitat later.

We are already living in our own exhausted and broken ecosystems. The only reason we can survive is because we maximise exploitation of areas outside of where we live. So, how is the 30 x 30 policy going to work? Isn’t it just creating the same problem on a bigger scale? Aren’t countries and big business going to use it as an excuse to do more damage in the remaining 70%, while eroding the values of the 30%?

The kind of systemic change that is needed to allow local communities to sustain themselves (and stop exploitation of protected areas) is only going to grow from the community itself. But at this scale, communities are largely disempowered and this leads to conflict.

Why do we need a change in human values?

For the COP15 30 x 30 plan to work, local community empowerment needs to be added. I would argue COP15 still omits one important animal – humans – from the systems we are trying to protect.

Creating any outcomes ‘at scale’ isn’t going to be achieved by mere policy. It requires a shift in the power base, from centralised decision-making, to local decisions. That political change is only going to occur if everyone starts to believe that animals, human (and nature) are equally important. But that conversation hasn’t happened yet.

As usual, we’re making policy decisions that can work in theory, but won’t operate in practice. Because we’re building them on unmitigated conflicts of interest from the start.

Outcomes need to start at the grassroots, regardless of how hard this might be. Policy change will make a difference but unless over half of us both believe and want to act on what needs to be done, it is unlikely to amount to very much.

Remember, belief doesn’t start with politicians – policy blows in the direction of those who shout loudest for change. Which is also why it’s worrying that there is a trend towards criminal charges for public demonstrations. Western countries, including Australia, are now imprisoning local people for demonstrating against the wholesale destruction of their communities due to environmental loss.

Silencing progressive voices denies society the chance to effect meaningful change. If we can’t get this right, then 30 x 30 will never work.

Summary points

• The 30 x 30 policy is progressive and important, because it represents solidarity among world leaders.
• It is already showing signs of being steered towards only protecting areas outside of where we live. In reality, we need 30% of everywhere protected. Thirty per cent of oceans, thirty per cent of primary forest, thirty per cent of our suburbs (including regenerative farming and forestry) and thirty per cent of our homes and gardens.
• There is a real risk that the 30% protection measures will be seen and used as an excuse to intensively mismanage our behaviour in the remaining 70%. That includes ‘offsets’ and other market-based mechanisms that are doomed to fail … we know this, because they are already failing and we haven’t removed the threats.
• Big business is being favoured over local enterprise. But the growth ideals of big business are inherently at conflict with the policy. Whereas community (local) businesses want to make a living but don’t necessarily seek unfettered growth.
• To achieve any functioning level of sustainability requires a change in human values. This means decentralising power and moving towards community-led decision-making.
• The focus on Indigenous populations is critical but that could also be used as a way to show intent, without actually addressing biodiversity loss over 70% of the planet. This would fail traditional owners as well as the environment.

Ten-point Plan for a change in human values

Will the COP15 30 x 30 plan work? Not without a change in human values. In my book ‘Wildlife in the Balance: Why Animals are Humanity’s Best Hope’, I have created a ten-point plan for a change in human values. These are among the first steps needed to alter the course of history so we have a better change of policies like 30 x 30 working.