Africa’s Drylands:
A Restoration Road Trip
Africa’s Drylands:
A Restoration Road Trip
Online and around the world
May 2021
#GLFAfrica
Go on a digital journey of Africa’s drylands with the Youth in Landscapes Initiative (YIL), the Global Landscapes Forum, World Agroforestry (ICRAF), and the Wageningen Centre for Development and Innovation (WCDI). Learn about land degradation, different types of land restoration, how to carry out stakeholder analysis, and more.
Who’s this program for?
The program is for any student or young professional, between 18 and 35, that:
- Has a strong interest in restoring Africa’s drylands;
- Is currently enrolled, or recently graduated from university with a degree related to sustainable development or has at least 1 year of experience restoring dryland ecosystems;
- Is managing – or is a part of – a restoration project in drylands (preferable but not required)
The deadline for application has passed, selected participants will be notified soon.
The Program
The learning program “Africa’s Drylands: A Restoration Road Trip” will explore what are the essential steps that need to be made in order to start a restoration project, and how to get there. Expert speakers will accompany participants through Africa’s drylands, and will answer key questions like: What do we restore first? Who should we involve? How do we restore drylands?
At the end of the program, it is expected that participants will have a deeper understanding of the steps needed to start restoring drylands in Africa.
Weekly interactive meetings
Weekly interactive meetings
Volunteer at GLF Africa 2021
Weekly interactive meetings
AGENDA
Online Course: Landscape Leadership
Unlock the knowledge and skills you need to kick-off and lead the changes you want to see in your landscape and work. Through this Massive Open Online Course MOOC you will learn from real-life leaders how they designed and facilitated change to better their landscape. You will be taken through challenging global cases and build your skills to lead change in landscapes. You will interact with other emerging landscape leaders who want to share and learn how change at the landscape level can be achieved. After this course, you will be ready to look at your landscape and know how to lead the way forward.
Click here to find more about the MOOC
The Program
The two-day GLF Biodiversity Digital Conference will gather students and young professionals from all over the world. Playing key roles as speakers, volunteers, moderators and MCs, youth will not only participate in the conference but will contribute to shaping the outcomes that emerge.
The two-day conference will be, for some, the last stop of a digital journey – and for others, the first destination: participants in the online course “Biodiversity: a Digital Journey” will use the knowledge and skills earned during the program to contribute to the conference conversations, while delegations from more than 15 youth organizations will embark on a new path with us – co-creating a biodiversity policy brief.
Conference attendees will also be able to start or finish their days with regionally focused Youth Daily Shows, which will explore biodiversity-related topics through the eyes of young speakers.
SOME OF YOUTH FORUM'S SPEAKERS
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Zero waste chef, environmentalist and author
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Managing Director
The Good Food Institute -
GLF Africa Coordinator
Greenpeace Africa -
Research Fellow
Africa Centre for Green Economy -
Wildlife Biologist
Asociación Territorios Vivos El Salvador -
Landscape architect and spatial planning
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Biologist
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YIL alumni representative
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Conservation professional
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Moderator and biologist
YOUTH AGENDA
A Restoration Road Trip
Agriculture is the main income source for most rural households in Asia and the Pacific region. However, the increasing biodiversity loss due to climate change represents a huge threat to people’s livelihoods, the consequences of which could be even more dangerous than the COVID-19 pandemic. To promote youth engagement in biodiversity protection toward achieving the UN 2030 Sustainable Development Goals, this Youth Daily Show – led by Young Professionals for Agricultural Development (YPARD) in collaboration with the Youth in Landscapes Initiative (YIL) – will explore what young Indigenous people working in agriculture are doing to preserve biodiversity
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Fardous Mohammad Safiul Azam
Country Representative, YPARD Bangladesh
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Lintang Kusuma P
Co-Founder and Chief, Agriculture Neurafarm
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Jieying Bi
YPARD Asia and Pacific Coordinator
Join us for an informal facilitated networking session. Guided by conversational menus you will have the opportunity to connect with fellow conference participants in short breakout sessions of 10 minutes each. These sessions are limited to 1,000 participants, on a first come, first served basis.
Visit the digital exhibition booths, brought to you by leading environmental and grassroots organizations. Connect and learn with 25 booths, open 24/7. In Whova, under Exhibitions.
Biodiversity is already a well-recognized element of sustainable forest management (SFM). The role of forests in maintaining biodiversity is also explicitly recognized by the UN Strategic Plan for Forests 2017-2030. The purpose of this session is to discuss the state of mainstreaming biodiversity in the forest sector, take stock of existing concepts and tools for integrating biodiversity in forest management and make recommendations for future actions. The results of the discussion will inform the research of FTA as well as preparatory work towards the implementation of FAO’s Strategy on Biodiversity Mainstreaming across Agricultural Sectors.
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Robert Nasi
Chief Operating Officer, CIFOR-ICRAF Director General, CIFOR, CIFOR-ICRAF, CIFOR
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Mette Løyche Wilkie
Director, Forestry Division, FAO
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Gervais Ludovic Itsoua Madzous
Deputy Executive Secretary, Technical Coordinator Republic of the Congo, COMIFAC
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Bård Vegar Solhjell
Director General, Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation, Norad
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Chantal Marijnissen
Head of Unit F2 (Environment, Sustainable Natural Resources) – DG INTPA, European Commission
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David Wilkie
Director, Conservation Measures, Wildlife conservation society (WCS)
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Pablo Pacheco
Lead Scientist, WWF/IUFRO-WFSE
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Andrea Morales
Wildlife Biologist, Asociación Territorios Vivos El Salvador
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Alexander Shestakov
Director of Division of the Convention , Biological Diversity
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Diqiang Li
Chinese Academy of Forestry
The COVID-19 pandemic highlights the power zoonoses have to disrupt our economies, public health and food systems. In response to this, One Health has grown as an approach for addressing the current inadequacies in responses to such global health crises, as well as playing an important role in addressing and mitigating climate change and biodiversity loss. This panel will highlight why those promoting a landscape approach should pay greater attention to landscape health and its relationship with animal (livestock and wildlife) and human health, as part of an integrated One Health approach. If landscape policies and investments continue to be made without taking into account a One Health lens, they will miss opportunities to contribute to addressing the biggest challenges of our time.
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Doreen Robinson
Chief for Wildlife, UN Environment Programme
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Fiona Flintan
Senior Scientist, ILRI, Italy and Ethiopia
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Bernard Bett
Senior Scientist, Animal and Human Health , International Livestock Research Institute
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Enkh-Amgalan Tseelei
Chairwoman , Mongolian National Federation of Pasture User Groups of Herders
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Dennis Carroll
Chair of the Leadership Board, Global Virome Project
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Fernanda Thomas da Rocha
Senior Regional Technical Specialist, Rural Institutions for the Latin America and the Caribbean region, IFAD
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Martina Fleckenstein
Global Policy Manager, Food Practice, WWF International
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Phuc Pham-Duc
Vice Deputy Director of the Center for Public Health and Ecosystem Research (CENPHER) Coordinator of the Vietnam One Health University Network (VOHUN)
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John Colmey
Managing Director, GLF
The zoonotic origins of COVID 19 and countries’ reactions to the pandemic raise important questions about the future of protected areas. First, does the threat of virus spillover events after all call for a stricter separation of nature and people despite all justified criticism of fortress conservation approaches? Second, how can conservation funding cope with dumps in international wildlife tourism? We will discuss these questions in the format of a digital roundtable with experts in protected areas from different backgrounds. We will include practical examples of the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on protected areas and aim to provide policy-oriented conclusions that could feed into the protected areas work at the upcoming IUCN World Conservation Congress and CBD COP 15.
Find this session’s white paper here.
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Anna Spenceley
Board Member, Global Sustainable Tourism Council
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Adrian Martin
Professor, School of International Development, University of East Anglia
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Herbert Lust
Senior Vice President of Global Public Partnerships and Senior Vice President and Managing Director, Conservation International Europe
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Maricela Fernández
Indigenous Cabécar leader
The environment, climate change, biodiversity, health, the economy – we face multiple crises. Deforestation and ecosystem degradation have not lost their momentum – we are losing biodiversity fast, reducing our ability to use land-based solutions. Mono-causal solutions have not worked for these interconnected problems. This interactive and informative session will invite the audience to learn and explore, with experts from science and indigenous peoples, how to deliver a green, just recovery: How are biodiversity and climate change linked? How can rights-based approaches protect and fully restore ecological functionality? Which policy processes and finances are needed? Where are the priorities?
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Kate Dooley
Research Fellow, University of Melbourne
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Christopher Martius
Team Leader, Climate Change, Energy & Low-Carbon Development, CIFOR-ICRAF
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Nonette Royo
Executive Director, The Tenure Facility
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Stephen Leonard
Senior Policy Analyst , Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR)
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Virginia Young
Member of the World Commission on Protected Areas and the IUCN Task force on Primary forests and Intact forest landscapes
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Tonio Sadik
Director of Environment, Assembly, First Nations (Canada)
Artifishal is a film about people, rivers, and the fight for the future of wild fish and the environment that supports them. It explores wild salmon’s slide toward extinction, threats posed by fish hatcheries and fish farms, and our continued loss of faith in nature.
The 252nd edition of international forestry journal Unasylva, “Restoring the Earth: the next decade”, is devoted to building momentum for the restoration agenda to 2030, particularly in light of the opportunities presented by major restoration commitments such as the Bonn Challenge, the New York Declaration on Forests, AFR100, Initiative 20×20 and the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration 2021-2030.
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Christophe Besacier
Senior Forestry Officer, Forest and Landscape Restoration Mechanism Forestry Division, FAO
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Faustine Zoveda
Forestry Officer, Forest and Landscape Restoration Mechanism Forestry Division , Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)
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Valentina Garavaglia
International consultant, Forest and Landscape Restoration Mechanism, Forestry Division, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)
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Katie Reytar
Senior Research Associate , World Resources Institute (WRI)
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Musonda Mumba
Secretary General , Convention on Wetlands
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Tom Lalampaa
Chief Executive Officer , Northern Rangelands Trust, Kenya
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Julien Noël Rakotoarisoa
Director General of Environmental Governance, Ministry of Environment and Sustainable Development, Madagascar
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Adriana Vidal
Senior Forest Policy Officer, IUCN
Years from now, historians will be discussing the reality we are living and the tomorrow we are defining. What will they call this age? The age of climate denial, the age of biodiversity loss or could it possible be the age of collective action? In a critical moment for the planet and all its peoples, the IPBES 2019 Global Assessment Report on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services, suggest that we all get on the train of Transformative Change – a profound, fundamental, system-wide and strategic change in discourses, actions, values and policy.
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Swetha Stotra Bhashyam
The Global South Focal Point, The Global Youth Biodiversity Network (GYBN)
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Simangele Msweli
The Steering Committee, The Global Youth Biodiversity Network
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Josefa Cariño Taulí
The Steering Committee, The Global Youth Biodiversity Network (GYBN
The variety of life on Earth is being lost at an unprecedented rate. Now more than ever, the health of our planet requires us to recognize our complex, interdependent relationships with nature. During this opening plenary, keynote speakers will interact with the online community to frame the wicked problems of biodiversity loss alongside land degradation, climate change and the emergence of zoonotic pandemics. We kick off the conference with a call for a One Health approach, spotlighting the essential role of biodiversity and setting the scene for building back better.
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Ashok Sridharan
Mayor of Bonn, President of ICLEI – Local Governments for Sustainability
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Jay Griffiths
Award winning author, Advocate of nature
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Elizabeth Mrema
Assistant Secretary-General and Deputy Executive Director, UN Environment Programme (UNEP)
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Shahid Naeem
E3B Professor, Chair of the Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Environmental Biology, Colombia University
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Laura H. Kahn
Physician and Research Scholar, Program on Science and Global Security at the Princeton University School of Public and International Affairs
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Yolanda Kakabadse Navarro
Former Minister of Environment for Ecuador
This participatory plenary will be framed around the post-2020 global biodiversity framework, the Paris climate goals and the UN Decade of Ecosystem Restoration, all of which call on the global community to ‘bend the curve’ on these critical issues. Key global policy makers, scientists as well as business and community leaders will inform the audience about plans in place for the new decade, and engage in critical discussion. Through constructive debate, we will explore how the new policy frameworks can spark a vivid societal dialogue, consolidate next steps and pave the way for direct global action from individuals, civil society, local authorities and the global business community.
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Musonda Mumba
Secretary General , Convention on Wetlands
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Sir Robert Watson
Head of the scientific advisory group for the UNEP Global Assessments Synthesis Report
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H.E. Fekadu Beyene Aleka
Commissioner, Environment, Forest and Climate Change Commission of Ethiopia
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Niria Alicia Garcia
Indigenous leader and innovator, UN Young Champion of the Earth finalist
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Johan Rockström
Director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research , Professor in Earth System Science at the University of Potsdam
Join leaders of the Asian Forest Cooperation Organization (AFoCO), World Agroforestry and Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR-ICRAF), Global EverGreening Alliance (Alliance) for the signing of a landmark partnership agreement to restore drylands and drought-prone areas in Asia.
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Robert Nasi
Chief Operating Officer, CIFOR-ICRAF Director General, CIFOR, CIFOR-ICRAF, CIFOR
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Tony Simons
Director General, World Agroforestry (ICRAF) , Executive Director, CIFOR-ICRAF
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Chris Armitage
CEO, Global EverGreening Alliance
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Chencho Norbu
Executive Director, Asian Forest Cooperation Organization (AFoCO)
Aware of the critical state of degradation of ecosystems worldwide, on 1 March 2019, under Resolution 73/284, the United Nations General Assembly proclaimed 2021 – 2030 to be the United Nations Decade on Ecosystem Restoration. The resolution calls for supporting and scaling up efforts to prevent, halt and reverse the degradation of ecosystems worldwide, as well as to raise awareness of the importance of ecosystem restoration. UNEP and FAO are the lead implementing UN agencies of the Decade and therefore, to support its implementation, a Task Force on Best Practices (TF) has been established involving a group of 85 individuals from 32 global leading organizations in the field of knowledge capitalization and dissemination. Led by FAO, this group is in charge of setting the ground for future efforts on knowledge capitalization and dissemination as well as the identification of new knowledge products, proposing an action plan for scientific research over the course of the Decade.
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Christophe Besacier
Senior Forestry Officer, Forest and Landscape Restoration Mechanism Forestry Division, FAO
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Faustine Zoveda
Forestry Officer, Forest and Landscape Restoration Mechanism Forestry Division , Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)
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Vera Boerger
Senior Land and Water Officer, Land and Water Division (NSL) , FAO
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Kathleen Buckingham
Senior Manager, Social Research, Data and Innovation, Global Restoration Initiative, World Resources Institute
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Robin Chazdon
Research and Consultant, Forestoration International
Global Biodiversity Outlook (GBO) is the flagship publication of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). GBO-5 provides global summary of progress towards the Aichi Biodiversity Targets and sets the scene for the development of the post 2020-global biodiversity framework. It is based on a range of indicators, research studies and assessments (in particular the IPBES Global Assessment on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services), as well as the national reports provided by countries on their implementation of the CBD. This Outlook draws on the lessons learned during the first two decades of this century to identify the transitions needed if we are to realize the vision agreed by world governments for 2050, ‘Living in Harmony with Nature’.
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David Cooper
Deputy Executive Secretary, United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) , Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD)
Once, conservation organizations and multilateral institutions regarded many remote indigenous and rural cultures as groups requiring relocation or “development” according to Western parameters. The 21st century has seen a burgeoning awareness that neither alternative is desirable. Nonetheless, there exists a relative dearth of examples of how best to partner with these increasingly imperiled communities to help protect their forests and their cultures as modernity presses in on all sides. This session focuses on successful efforts in northern Amazonia to help forest communities seize control of their destinies while developing a broader governance vision for indigenous stewardship that emphasizes nonlinear economies.
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Mark J. Plotkin
President and Board member , Amazon Conservation Team
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Carolina Gil
Northwest Amazon Regional Director, Amazon Conservation Team
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María del Rosario “Charito” Chicunque
Kamentsa indigenous leader and traditional healer
The session will launch the White Paper and Policy Brief “Build Back Better in a post-COVID world – Reducing future wildlife-borne spillover of disease to humans” produced by the Sustainable Wildlife Management Programme. Presenters will discuss alternative strategies to tackle the drivers of zoonotic disease emergence and their spread along wildlife value chains. They will emphasize the need to consider and involve the millions of citizens, communities and Indigenous People who rely on wildlife for food, income and cultural identity. Discussions will focus on how to encourage policy dialogue and coordinated targeted investments to prevent, detect and respond to future pandemics.
- Philippe Mayaux, Head of sector Biodiversity and ecosystem services – Directorate-General for International Cooperation and Development (DG DEVCO) – European Commission
- Michelle Edgardine Ngwapaza, Deputy General Director and National focal point for the SWM Programme in Gabon – Wildlife and Protected Areas General Directorate (DGFAP), Ministry of waters, forests, sea and environment, in charge of Climate Plan and Land Use Plan – Republic of Gabon (Central Africa)
- Nickolas Fredericks, Current Toshao (indigenous village chief) for Shulinab village. Current chairman of the National Toshaos Council, the highest representative body for Indigenous Peoples in Guyana
- Nathalie van Vliet, Associate researcher – Site Coordinator SWM Programme Guyana – CIFOR
- Amanda Fine, Associate Director, Wildlife Health Programme WCS
- Marisa Peyre, Deputy Head ASTRE research unit – CIRAD
- Keith Sumption, Chief Veterinary Officer and Leader of the Animal Health Programme at FAO Director of the Joint Centre for Zoonoses and Anti-Microbial Resistance (CJWZ)
Find this session’s white paper here.
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Maria Helena Semedo
Deputy Director-General and Chair , Collaborative Partnership on Forests, FAO
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Philippe Mayaux
Head of sector Biodiversity and ecosystem services - Directorate-General for International Cooperation and Development (DG DEVCO), European Commission
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Michelle Edgardine Ngwapaza
Deputy General Director & National focal point for the SWM Programme in Gabon - Wildlife and Protected Areas General Directorate (DGFAP), Ministry of waters, forests, sea and environment, in charge of Climate Plan and Land Use Plan – Republic of Gabon (Central Africa)
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Nickolas Fredericks
Current Toshao (indigenous village chief) for Shulinab village. Current chairman of the National Toshaos Council, the highest representative body for Indigenous Peoples in Guyana , Current chairman for the South Rupununi District Council (a representative body for the 21 Southern Rupununi indigenous communities)
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Amanda Fine
Associate Director, Wildlife Health Programme WCS
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Marisa Peyre
Deputy Head, ASTRE research unit, CIRAD
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Keith Sumption
Chief Veterinary Officer and Leader of the Animal Health Programme at FAO , Director of the Joint Centre for Zoonoses and Anti-Microbial Resistance (CJWZ)
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Cristelle Pratt
Assistant Secretary-General, Department of Environment and Climate Action, Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States
Our global food systems depend on agrobiodiversity – that is, the vast diversity of crops, trees and livestock that underpins our entire agricultural system, make it less vulnerable to pests and diseases, and contribute to landscape restoration and resilience in the midst of the climate crisis. Through Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) Target 2.5, we have pledged to ensure the conservation and sustainable use of all our agrobiodiversity by 2020. However, even though we have made significant strides towards hitting the target, we are still far from implementation.
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Charlotte Lusty
Head of Programmes, Global Crop Diversity Trust
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Desterio Nyamongo
Senior Principal Research Officer and Director, Genetic Resources Research Institute Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organization
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Lavernee Gueco
Researcher - College of Agriculture and Food Science , University of Los Banos - The Philippines
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Vania Azevedo
Head, Genebank, ICRISAT
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Nelissa Jamora
Agricultural Economist
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Maarten van Zonneveld
Genebank Manager, World Vegetable Center
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Filippo Bassi
Senior Scientist, International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas
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Alejandro Argumedo
Program Director, Asociación ANDES
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Shivali Sharma
Theme Leader, Pre-breeding; and Senior Scientist – Genetic Resources at ICRISAT-Hyderabad
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Maria Andrade
Scientist and World Food Prize Laureate, International Potato Center
Peatlands, a Super Nature Based Solution (Spanish audio)
Peatlands, a Super Nature Based Solution (French audio)
This session will take you on a two-part peatlands journey to some of the most rare, remote and unique places in the world. Many peatlands offer a safe haven for rare and threatened biodiversity – from the orangutan of Indonesia to the golden sphagnum moss of Northern Ireland. Transport yourself to the remote forested swamps of the Congo Basin and then onward to the tip of the South American continent. Peatlands also offer vital stopping-off points for migratory species – connecting species to special places across the globe. Peatlands can also be carbon-packed micro-rainforests that house bizarre creatures and tales of the past. UNEP invites you to discover why peatlands are a critical habitat for biodiversity and what they offer to our climate and our health. This world tour will provide examples and share experiences and strategies, while highlighting the important role that partnerships can play in safeguarding biodiversity.
Find this session’s white paper here.
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Arlette Soudan-Nonault
Minister of Environment and Tourism, Republic of Congo
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Gabriel Quijandría Acosta
Vice Minister, Strategic Development of Natural Resources, Peru
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Musonda Mumba
Secretary General , Convention on Wetlands
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Alue Dohong
Vice Minister, Ministry Environment and Forestry, Republic of Indonesia
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Kristine Tompkins
Cofounder and president, Tompkins Conservation, UN Patron of Protected Areas
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Ifo Suspense
Marien Ngouabi University, Republic of Congo
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Franziska Tanneberger
Head , Greifswald Mire Centre
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Tina Claffey
Award winning nature photographer
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Hans Schutten
Programme Head , Climate-smart Land Use of Wetlands International
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Amy Fraenkel
Executive Secretary , Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS)
To implement the Post-2020 Biodiversity Framework, a major challenge will be to customize and redesign financial instruments to ensure that investment plans are evaluated for their potential risk to nature, or to create incentives for biodiversity-friendly investment into value chains. The session will bring together expert practitioners from the public and private sectors in multiple continents to discuss existing approaches in the field of financial instruments, good practices and lessons learned, as well as how to bring successful approaches to scale and how to link COVID-19 response measures to financing for a biodiversity-friendly future.
Find this session’s white paper here.
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Monique Akullo
National Coordinator, Biodiversity Finance Initiative, UNDP
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Gabriel Quijandría Acosta
Vice Minister, Strategic Development of Natural Resources, Peru
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Vinod Mathur
Chairman, National Biodiversity Authority
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Maureen Erasmus
Advisor and Non-Executive Director
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Rodrigo de la Cruz
Technical Advisor to the Indigenous Forum , Abya Yala (FIAY) and International Indigenous Forum on Biodiversity (IIFB)
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Hugo Verkuijl
Program Development Manager Sustainable Food , Hivos
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Humberto Delgado Rosa
Director for Natural Capital, European Commission, Directorate General for the Environment
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Sascha Müller-Kraenner
Executive Director, Environmental Action Germany (DUH)
The triple challenge is the imperative to simultaneously deliver a stable climate, recovering biodiversity and healthy food for 10 billion people by 2050. Building on discussions at the GLF Bonn in June, this event advances thinking on the concept further, and explores the implications through a deep dive into the case of the Greater Virunga Landscape. In the Virunga landscape this triple challenge looms large, as does the risk of disease transmission between both wildlife and humans, making the One Health approach essential. The discussion will combine speakers from the landscape with external experts and the audience to explore how to negotiate and balance these challenges.
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Gary Tabor
President, Centre for Large Landscapes Conservation
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David Duli
Country Director, WWF Uganda
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Will Baldwin-Cantello
Chief Adviser on Forests, WWF-UK
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Anna Behm Masozera
Director, International Gorilla Conservation Programme
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Ruth Edma Mwizeere
Environmental Scientist and Activist
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Beatrice Kabihogo
Founder and team leader, Uplift the Rural Poor
The COVID pandemic has brought new attention to the importance of landscape health for human health in addition to economic resilience. The transfer of zoonotic diseases from animals to humans makes clear the interdependence of human and animal health on terrestrial ecosystems, and the risks of ecosystem degradation due to human activity. Healthy landscapes are also critical for healthy economies, providing essential ecosystem services such as water, fertile soil, and erosion prevention. In many places, nature and wildlife provide the basis for nature-based tourism (NBT) that provides important income for protected area management and for jobs for local communities.
This session will look at pathways for spillover of zoonotic diseases such as COVID-19 from animals to humans, what actions can manage or stop spill over and how a One Health approach that looks at human, animal and environmental health together can make a difference. The session will also explore tools that can help bring back NBT as the world recovers from COVID-19, how restoration is important to human health, and how approaches to landscape management are evolving to encompass health considerations.
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Raina Plowright
Associate Professor of Microbiology and Immunology, Montana State University (MSU)
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Brooklin Hunt
Student majoring in Pre-Veterinary Microbiology and Animal Systems Biotechnology at Montana State University (MSU)
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Daniel Mira-Salama
Senior Environmental Specialist, World Bank
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Urvashi Narain
Lead Economist, Environment, Natural Resources and Blue Economy, World Bank
Agricultural supply chains are the leading driver of deforestation globally, contributing to the depletion of biodiversity and natural ecosystems. In this plenary, the audience will get an inside look at the interrelation between finance for biodiversity and sustainable land use and healthy landscapes and sustainable, inclusive value chains. A discussion among experts will place local communities at the heart of the discussion while exploring the innovative financial instruments that are needed to spark a bioeconomy, grounded in the rights and expertise of local communities.
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Maria Amália Souza
Founder & Strategic Development Director, Fundo Casa Socio Ambiental
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Priya Shyamsundar
Lead Economist, The Nature Conservancy
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Jennifer Pryce
President and CEO, Calvert Impact Capital
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Martin Berg
Climate Asset Management
The session will envisage what the next steps should be for SDG 2.5 in the post-2020 Agenda. Where do we go from here? It will seek to demonstrate why agrobiodiversity is essential to ensure food and nutrition security for current and future global populations. The greater the diversity, the more resilient the system. Protecting crops and livestock from pests and disease, and ensuring they have improved resistance to increasing climatic shocks is essential. But how do we get there?
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Danielle Nierenberg
President and Co-Founder, Food Tank
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Sir Peter Crane
Board Chair and President, Oak Spring Garden Foundation
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Marie Haga
Associate Vice President for External Relations and Governance, IFAD
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Kent Nnadozie
Secretary, International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture
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Susan Bragdon
Policy Advisor, Oxfam Novib
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Mildred Crawford
Caribbean Network of Rural Women Producers, Farmers Co-Chair of the Executive Committee of the Global Assembly of Partners towards Habitat III (GAP)
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Tina Claffey
Award winning nature photographer
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Pablo Vargas
CEO , Britt
In Latin America, multiple drivers are putting pressure on biodiversity and natural ecosystems. This plenary will build on the issues raised in the ‘Financing Diversity’ plenary to shed light on opportunities and challenges to sustainable climate finance in the Amazon basin and the Latin American region at large. The debate will speak to financial innovations at the intersection of biodiversity and climate action and explore the initiatives and instruments needed to achieve a bio-economy that is truly based on nature’s richness, is gender–inclusive, and is grounded in the rights and expertise of Indigenous Peoples.
The two-part discussion will primarily be held in Portuguese and Spanish, with English translation.
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Marina Campos
Founder and Executive Director, Conexsus - US
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Marianella Feoli
Executive Director, Fundecooperacion for Sustainable Development
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Elcio Machinery
Coordinator, Coordination of the Indigenous Organizations of the Brazilian Amazon (COIAB)
In Latin America, multiple drivers are putting pressure on biodiversity and natural ecosystems. This plenary will build on the issues raised in the ‘Financing Diversity’ plenary to shed light on opportunities and challenges to sustainable climate finance in the Amazon basin and the Latin American region at large. The debate will speak to financial innovations at the intersection of biodiversity and climate action and explore the initiatives and instruments needed to achieve a bio-economy that is truly based on nature’s richness, is gender–inclusive, and is grounded in the rights and expertise of Indigenous Peoples.
The two-part discussion will primarily be held in Portuguese and Spanish, with English translation.
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Marina Campos
Founder and Executive Director, Conexsus - US
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Marianella Feoli
Executive Director, Fundecooperacion for Sustainable Development
A Restoration Road Trip
Join us for an informal facilitated networking session. Guided by conversational menus you will have the opportunity to connect with fellow conference participants in short breakout sessions of 10 minutes each. These sessions are limited to 1,000 participants, on a first come, first served basis.
Visit the digital exhibition booths, brought to you by leading environmental and grassroots organizations. Connect and learn with 25 booths, open 24/7. In Whova, under Exhibitions.
Rangelands (grassland, savannahs and silvo-pastoral systems) in dry areas and mountains account for the largest global restoration opportunities for ecosystems, human and environmental health, and economic growth.
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Hanspeter Liniger
University of Bern
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Chris Magero
Programme Officer, IUCN
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Fiona Flintan
Senior Scientist, ILRI, Italy and Ethiopia
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Paola Agostini
Lead Natural Resources Management Specialist, Europe and Central Asia, World Bank
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Boshra Salem
Professor, University of Alexandria, Egypt
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Azamat Isakov
Project Coordinator , Public Foundation CAMP Ala-Too
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Beatriz Ramirez and Luisa Vega
Director, Wajari
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Jonathan Davies
Global Drylands Coordinator / Senior Agriculture Advisor, International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)
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Rima Mekdaschi Studer
Senior Research Scientist at the Centre for Development and Environment (CDE), WOCAT (World Overview of Conservation Approaches and Technologies )
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Alissa Wachter
Leader of the Resource Mobilisation and Program Development for WWF's global Food Practice, WWF
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John Kamanga
Director, South Rift Association of Land Owners (SORALO)
Integrated landscape approaches feature prominently in recent UN conventions as promoted strategies to address inter-connected social, political, economic and environmental challenges in tropical frontier landscapes. However, evidence of their effectiveness remains poorly researched, reported and understood. This session will address this gap through a book launch that showcases COLANDS initiatives that are implementing integrated landscape approaches in Ghana, Zambia, and Indonesia. Speakers will share their experiences of conceptualizing, designing and implementing landscape approaches, including: why biodiversity needs to be integrated within landscape approaches, how better governance can be achieved, what evaluation approaches are appropriate and how to bridge sectorial, disciplinary and knowledge system divides.
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Eric Bayala
PhD Candidate, University of Amsterdam and CIFOR
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Joli Rumi Borah
Post-doc researcher, University of British Columbia
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Colas Chervier
Scientist, CIRAD
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Valentinus Heri
Director, Riak Bumi
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Terry Sunderland
University of British Columbia
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James Reed
Researcher, Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR)
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Mirjam Ros-Tonen
Associate professor at the Department of Social Geography, Planning & International Development Studies, University of Amsterdam
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Samuel Adeyanju
Environmental sustainability professional
Journey to Malaysian Borneo with The Borneo Project to learn about the rare wildlife of this unique island and see how local communities are involved in documenting and maintaining forest health! Join Fi, Bryan, Shahnaz, and Jettie on an exploration of the rainforests of the Baram River Basin to learn about a community-led project to document the endemic species of this ecosystem. This extraordinary, remote land is home to the Orang Ulu, which roughly means “people of the interior”, a term that includes many different indigenous groups. Together we will discuss how community-led forest protection is an essential tool in maintaining biodiversity, and we will even see some of the rare species that have evolved to suit this particular climate. It’s everything you could want from an exotic eco-tour, minus the mosquitos and humidity!
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Shahnaz Sahmat
Researcher, Institute of Biodiversity and Environmental Conservation, Universiti Malaysia Sarawak
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Fiona McAlpine
Communications and Project Manager, The Borneo Project
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Bryan Anderson
Field Manager, SAVE Rivers Network
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Jettie Word
Executive Director, The Borneo Project
The Hindu Kush Himalayan (HKH) region extends across eight countries from Afghanistan in the west to Myanmar in the east, crossing Pakistan, India, China, Nepal, Bhutan and Bangladesh. It is a globally important resource – biologically and culturally rich, it provides ecosystem goods and services to a quarter of the world’s population. The HKH is the Pulse of the Planet – what happens here affects the rest of the world. This session will explain why the HKH is the Pulse of the Planet and the need to reinforce positive relations between biodiversity, landscapes, culture and health in a post-COVID ‘new normal’.
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Pema Gyamtsho
Director General , ICIMOD
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Eklabya Sharma
Deputy Director General, ICIMOD
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Sonam Tashi Lama
Program Coordinator, Red Panda Network
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Mehjabeen Abidi-Habib
Ecologist and Writer, Independent Consultant
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Jamyang Dolkar
Associate Lecturer, Royal University of Bhutan
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Sarala Khaling
Regional Director, Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE)
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Fu Yao
Ethnobotanist
The new CBD Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) will build on a theory of change aiming for transformative shifts and involving the whole of society. Landscape-based initiatives and approaches across the globe have evidenced the potential contribution of non-state actors in achieving global goals. Landscape governance arrangements are complementary to existing CBD approaches, and align with the GBF objectives. This session will highlight and discuss the role of landscape approaches and arrangements undertaken by non-state actors to support the GBF, discuss how policies could support this and illustrate the potential for area-based non-state actor GBF commitments and verification.
Knowledge products:
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Marcel Kok
Programme leader, International Biodiversity Policy, PBL Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency
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Johan Meijer
Researcher, PBL Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency
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John Ajjugo
Policy analyst , HoAREC&N - African Landscapes Dialogue
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Maiko Nishi
Research fellow, Satoyama Initiative - United Nations University
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Nina Bhola
Senior programme officer, UNEP-WCMC
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Sophie Persey
Senior Programme Manager, LandScale, Rainforest Alliance
Humanity’s destruction of biodiversity creates the perfect conditions for diseases like COVID-19 to emerge. Our lives depend on protecting our forests – not only to prevent future pandemics but also to reverse the impacts of catastrophic climate change. Indigenous communities in Sarawak are hard at work applying local solutions to these immense global challenges by protecting some of the richest tropical rainforests on earth. In this session, learn from grassroots leaders about what Indigenous-managed forest protection looks like on the ground: from investing in village-led research, mapping and forest management, to cancelling the construction of the second largest mega-dam of its kind in the world.
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Peter Kallang
Chairman, SAVE Rivers
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Jettie Word
Executive Director, The Borneo Project
Business, the environment and society need to be addressed simultaneously if we are to achieve economic and ecological restoration and a future balance.
Coffee is the second most traded commodity in the world and Uganda, the world’s 6th largest exporter, is home to almost 20% of the world’s coffee smallholding farmers. In Bugisu, on Mount Elgon, the farmers live remotely at high altitude adjacent to a UNESCO Man & Biosphere Reserve. A spiral of worsening deforestation in tandem with aggressive climate events of worsening flash floods and landslides is occurring and is at a point where their last economic activity – coffee farming, is at risk.
Small businesses can experiment in business models and CARICO Café has worked with these communities using their coffee livelihood holistically as a socio-economic-ecological lever. Despite improving quality and yield, driving end-consumer knowledge of origin, livelihoods remain poor.
The session will discuss the value of holistic triple levers to address the challenge of reversal and restoration of biodiversity.
Find this session’s white paper here.
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Mwambu Wanendeya
CEO and Founder, Carico
As we proceed through the 21st century and confront today’s biodiversity crisis, we on one hand realize how intertwined our well-being is with our biodiversity and ecosystem health, and on the other hand, we find ourselves immersed in a globalized urban cultural dimension detached from our roots.
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Tisha Ramadhin
Community Relations , Fairventures Worldwide FVW Indonesia
Learn with forestry experts in Malawi, swim with Indigenous leaders in reef systems off the coast of Mexico and restore the Earth with young people in every landscape.
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Mukhwana Laura
Chapter Coordinator , GLFx Nairobi
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Sabine Cudney
Chapter Coordinator , GLFx Veracruz
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Steve Makungwa
Senior lecturer, Centre for Applied Systems Analysis, Malawi
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Salina Abraham
Chief of Staff to CEO, CIFOR-ICRAF
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Vania Olmos Lau
Moderator and biologist
For hundreds of generations, the Gwich’in people of Alaska and northern Canada have depended on the caribou that migrate through the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. With their traditional culture now threatened by oil extraction and climate change, two Gwich’in women are continuing a decades-long fight to protect their land and future.
The Arctic Refuge is home to lands and wildlife vital for the subsistence way of life of Alaska Native communities; and it serves a vital role as a remaining link with the unspoiled natural world and a source of hope for future generations, even for those who may never set foot there.
The Trump administration is proceeding with plans to give oil and gas companies the right to drill in the coastal plain of the Arctic Refuge. Drilling will destroy intact wilderness and violate the human rights of the Gwich’in, who rely on this sacred place to sustain their culture and w
This session will highlight the need for recognition of the contributions of mixed, diverse agricultural/agrarian landscapes – not only to biodiversity conservation, but also to the development of more resilient food systems to respond to challenges like those that the world is currently facing. Global policies, such as those of the CBD, have conventionally seen agriculture as a threat to biodiversity. Hence, responses have often focused on promoting the protection of natural ecosystems by concentrating efforts on preventing further expansion of agriculture. We argue that the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework will be seriously flawed if it fails to tackle the effect of food systems and agriculture on biodiversity, or fails to bring farmers into the alliance towards biodiversity conservation and sustainable production. ICRAF and GIZ are the main organizing partners for this session. The CBD Secretariat, IUCN, national representatives, a representative of the private sector and a farmers’ representative will also participate.
Find this session’s white paper here.
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Alka Bhargava
Additional Secretary, Ministry of Agricultural Cooperation and Farmers Welfare, Government of India
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Lorena Frier
Regional Manager Asia, PUR Projet
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Thomas Jacob
Advisor, Peermade Development Society Organic Spices
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Peter Zens
Director, Nutrition and Consumption, Cologne Climate Council
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Tobias Ludes
Programme Manager, Business and Biodiversity, Global Nature Fund
This session will discuss how jurisdictions with sustainability commitments can restore biodiversity and ecosystem values through a nature-based economy that enhances the value of local sustainable products and services sourced from healthy ecological areas. Representatives from government, civil society, community and the private sector will discuss progress in building a nature-based economy through jurisdictional approaches at the district level in Indonesia. To harness global support for LTKL member districts, the panel brings perspectives from partners working in Southeast Asia and Latin America. Insights from this panel will inform other jurisdictions embarking on similar journeys. The session will close by launching the first LTKL jurisdictional profile for Sintang district.
Find this session’s white paper here.
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Eka Chandra Buana
Director for Macro Planning and Statistical Analysis, Indonesia Ministry of National Development Planning
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Musrahmad
Founder, ExploreSiak
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Amy Duchelle
Senior Forestry Officer & Team Leader Climate Change & Resilience, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)
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Florentinus Anum
Head of District Government Sintang in West Kalimantan , Province of Indonesia
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Nurdiana Darus
Head of Corporate Affairs and Sustainability, Unilever Indonesia
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Sanjiv Louis
Investment Director for SE Asia, Sail Ventures
Since 2007, the Central African Forest Observatory (OFAC) has been working to create information networks, establish analytical and communication tools, and produce flagship regional publications to provide reliable, relevant and accessible data on the state of Central Africa’s forests.
The session will interactively present the different tools available for policymakers, researchers, NGOs, donors, private sector and students working in the region to obtain information related to biodiversity and forest management.
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Florence Palla
Regional coordinator , OFAC support project (RIOFAC)
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Donald Djossi
Data management analyst , COMIFAC
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Quentin Jungers
Technical Assistant , OFAC Information System (RIOFAC)
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Tanya Merceron
Regional coordinator , BIOPAMA-IUCN program
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Richard Eba'a Atyi
Senior Scientist and Hub Leader, CIFOR
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Raymond Ndomba Ngoye
Executive Secretary, Central African Forest Commission (COMIFAC)
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Philippe Mayaux
Head of sector Biodiversity and ecosystem services - Directorate-General for International Cooperation and Development (DG DEVCO), European Commission
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Honoré Tabuna
Commissioner for the Environment, Natural Resources, Agriculture and Rural Development, Economic Community, Central African States (CEEAC)
Depuis 2007, l’Observatoire des forêts d’Afrique centrale (OFAC) agit pour créer des réseaux d’information, mettre en place des outils d’analyse et de communication, et produire des publications régionales pour fournir des données fiables, pertinentes et accessibles sur l’état des forêts d’Afrique centrale.
La session présentera de manière interactive les différents outils disponibles pour les décideurs, les chercheurs, les ONG, les bailleurs, le secteur privé et les étudiants engagés dans la région pour obtenir des informations relatives à la biodiversité et à la gestion des forêts.
More than ever, we are realizing how interconnected we are. Public health, biodiversity, and ecosystem restoration are interconnected. Biodiversity underpins life on Earth; it protects our health and wellbeing and it is up to us to restore it.
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Chris Armitage
CEO, Global EverGreening Alliance
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Fred Stolle
Deputy Director, Forests Program, World Resources Institute (WRI)
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Winfrida J. Kipondya
Monitoring, Evaluation Evidence and learning Coordinator, Care Tanzania
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Talia Liney
Monitoring and data systems, Global Evergreening Alliance
The Amazon, the Earth’s largest and most diverse rainforest, biodiversity hotspot and home to many indigenous communities, is on fire. The majority of these fires are not wildfires – they are ignited and can often be traced back to illegal forest clearing to create land for monocultures and support the increasing demand for commodities such as soy, coffee, cocoa and palm oil. Fires are just one of the impacts that monocultures have on the Amazons. During this Youth Daily Show, the Youth in Landscapes Initiative discusses with young experts from the Latin America Region the impacts of monocultures on the health of the local ecosystem and its biodiversity, as well as the health and food security of local communities.
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Heitor Mancini Teixeira
Researcher, Wageningen University & Research
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Débora Lima
Post doctorate researcher , University of São Paulo, Brazil
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Carla Madueno
Ecologist , YIL Alumni Representative
While the world seems to get further entangled in a web of concurrent crises, there are a growing number of leaders and experts who are sparking new hope and trust in the future. GLF took the effort to find the experts sharing their visions on the state of biodiversity and gathered them in a single digital space to share their inspirational knowledge. Don’t miss this unique opportunity to listen in, learn and get inspired on why biodiversity is essential to building back better.
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Carole Dieschbourg
Minister for the Environment, Climate and Sustainable Development of Luxembourg
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Robert Nasi
Chief Operating Officer, CIFOR-ICRAF Director General, CIFOR, CIFOR-ICRAF, CIFOR
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Stefan Schmitz
Executive Director, Crop Trust
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Gilbert Houngbo
President, International Fund For Agricultural Development (IFAD)
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Bård Vegar Solhjell
Director General, Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation, Norad
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Jennifer Morgan
Executive Director, Greenpeace
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Galina Angarova
Executive Director, Cultural Survival
Growing food and fiber with industrial techniques has devastated our climate. Conventional agriculture contributes up to 25% of the emissions driving the climate crisis. But there’s another way. Regenerative organic methods can build healthy soil which helps draw carbon back in the ground.
Because healthy soil traps carbon, many believe that regenerative organic farming methods have the potential to change the way we grow food and fiber and restore the health of our soil and climate. These practices help build healthy soil that could help draw down more carbon from the atmosphere than conventional methods. Regenerative organic agriculture could be a viable way to help stop climate change before it’s too late.
The New York Declaration on Forests (NYDF) aims to halt natural forest loss by 2030, contributing to climate, biodiversity, and sustainable development goals. The session will cover the findings of the 2020 NYDF Assessment on extractive industries and infrastructure. A panel discussion will address the urgent need for transforming approaches to planning and implementing large-scale development projects and the role of forests and the NYDF post-2020. The discussion will focus on promoting transparency and accountability in mining and infrastructure sectors; safeguarding Indigenous peoples’ rights; building incentives for responsible sourcing; and reshaping the NYDF and international commitments.
Read the White Paper here.
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Vinamra Mathur
Regional Director for Asia-Pacific, Youth4Nature
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Erin D. Matson
Senior Consultant, Climate Focus
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Diego Moreno
Director of Environmental Control of the Ministry of Environment and Water, Government of Ecuador
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Laura George
Advocacy and Rights Coordinator, Amerindian Peoples Association
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Marcela Bocchetto
Manager Biodiversity and Climate Change, Anglo American
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Pippa Howard
Director of the Business & Biodiversity Programme, Flora and Fauna International
Rewilding is a new, (pro)active approach to biodiversity conservation. Restoring ecosystems is key to our public health and mental well-being, and vital in the fight against climate change and mass extinction. The goal of this session is to discuss and promote sound models of rewilding, in order to reach and maintain a favourable level of health for habitats and species. Can we bring back natural processes while promoting socio-economic development and supporting rural communities? In this session, we share experiences with rewilding projects, and look at possible funding and income-generating mechanisms that contribute to healthy, life-supporting landscapes and rural development.
Find this session’s white paper here.
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Kristine Tompkins
Cofounder and president, Tompkins Conservation, UN Patron of Protected Areas
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J. Luis Martínez-Zaporta
Country Program Manager, TNF, Spain
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Rebecca Wrigley
Co-founder, Rewilding Britain
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Neil Birnie
Partner & CEO, Conservation Capital, United Kingdom
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Stefanie Lindenberg
Coordinator, Natural Capital Finance Facility, European Investment Bank, Belgium
Biological diversity celebrates its 3.7 billionth birthday this year. From common ancestors, all forms of life sprang up from a few grams of the same chemical building blocks. But “biodiversity” as a word is only 35 years’ old this year having been coined by E.O. Wilson and other ecologists in 1985. The term “biodiversity” is now co-owned by scientists, politicians, philanthropists and civil society – but has only recently become a priority of the corporate sector and private investors.
Biodiversity is a bit nebulous. Few convincing answers are evident for the commercial world on questions such as: what are the most important assets of biodiversity and what is the return on investment in biodiversity? At the same time, businesses do understand emerging risks and liabilities if biodiversity is ignored. We have not adequately answered the related question on how can business and biodiversity mutually benefit each other? Resilient Landscapes seeks to answer that question in agricultural and forest landscapes through engaging with interested private sector and investment actors.
Today, agriculture accounts for 70% of the projected loss of terrestrial biodiversity. It contributes to 50% of the topsoil lost. We use 40% of Earth’s land surface to produce food, making it the single largest cause of deforestation, habitat and biodiversity loss. Yet with the world’s population rising, we will need to double food production by 2050. Given the arable land available, current “business as usual” models are insufficient.
At the same time, half of the world’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP), €40 trillion, depends on nature.[1] The world already loses an estimated €5.5-10.5 trillion per year from land degradation and biodiversity loss further puts our food systems and nutrition at risk[2].
Addressing the current biodiversity crisis is crucial to planetary and ecological health. Preliminary research indicates that significant biodiversity loss results in a greater transmissibility of human diseases, which can be seen from a substantial increase in zoonosis, including SARS, Ebola, Lyme and COVID-19. In doing so, public-private partnerships will play a crucial role in supporting commitment to action toward financing biodiversity.
Furthermore, there is growing recognition that public funds are insufficient to reverse biodiversity loss. A report recently released by the Paulson Institute shows that the funding gap for biodiversity is $700 billion per year for the next decade. The financial sector has a critical role in addressing the global biodiversity crisis, while governments and regulators hold the key to harnessing the power of the financial sector to mobilize private finance at scale to protect nature[3].
[1] EU Biodiversity Strategy for 2030
[2] EU Biodiversity Strategy for 2030
[3] Mobilizing Private Finance for Nature, World Bank Group Report
Introduction & Welcome remarks: Leona Liu, Deputy-Director, Resilient Landscapes (03:00)
Keynote Address by Video: Prof. Thomas Lovejoy, University Professor of Environmental Science and Policy of George Mason University (02:17)
Keynote Address: Gonzalo Munoz, COP25 High-Level Champion – (03:00)
Panel One: Natural Capital Appreciation
Moderator Introductions: Christopher Knowles, Senior Advisor, Environment & Climate Finance
Resilient Landscapes (05:00)
Facilitated Panel: Supporting biodiversity and resilient landscapes through innovative finance mechanisms
1. Jaspreet Stamm, Director, Finance in Motion (05:00)
2. Andre van den Beld, Head Sustainability – Cocoa at Export Trading Group (ETG) (05:00)
3. Martin Geiger, Director Sustainability and Corporate Governance, DEG Deutsche Investitions- und Entwicklungsgesellschaft mbH (05:00)
4. Fabian Huwlyer, Founding Partner, Posaidon Capital(05:00)
Closing Remarks & Transition to Panel Two: Christopher Knowles, Senior Advisor, Environment & Climate Finance, Resilient Landscapes (03:00)
Panel Two: Supply Chains & Biodiversity in the post COVID-19 Era
Moderator Introductions: Howard-Yana Shapiro, Senior Advisor, Private Sector & Markets, Resilient Landscapes, Distinguished Senior Fellow, CIFOR-ICRAF (05:00)
Facilitated Panel: Biodiversity & Agricultural Landscapes
1. Jason Clay, Senior Vice President, Markets, Executive Director, Markets Institute, WWF (05:00)
Topics: 1. Nexus between biodiversity and resilient landscapes; 2. Improvement of certification through the new Agricultural Performance System
2. Susan Chomba, Project Manager, Regreening Africa, World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) (05:00)
Topics: 1. Re-greening Africa and the new Agricultural Performance System; 2. Biodiversity & Resilient Landscapes
3. Mette Wilkie, Director, Forestry Division, FAO (05:00)
Topics: 1. Value of forests in terms of benefits to livelihoods; 2. FAO’s SOFO 2020 and the need for the call to action on biodiversity efforts
Closing remarks: Tony Simons, Director General, World Agroforestry (ICRAF) , Executive Director, CIFOR-ICRAF (05:00)
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Jaspreet Stamm
Director, Finance in Motion
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André van den Beld
Head Sustainability - Cocoa , Export Trading Group
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Martin Geiger
Director Sustainability and Corporate Governance , DEG
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Fabian Huwlyer
Founding Partner, Posaidon Capital
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Jason Clay
Senior Vice President, Markets, Executive Director, Markets Institute, WWF
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Susan Chomba
Director of Vital Landscapes, World Resources Institute (WRI)
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Mette Løyche Wilkie
Director, Forestry Division, FAO
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Tony Simons
Director General, World Agroforestry (ICRAF) , Executive Director, CIFOR-ICRAF
Indigenous peoples are the time-immemorial guardians of many of the world’s remaining biodiversity-rich landscapes – and of the spirituality, values and worldviews embedded in these physical spaces. As human encroachments threaten Indigenous ways of life and connection to land, the world urgently needs to find ways to support this guardianship to help ensure the health of the planet and diversity of species. This interactive plenary will amplify the voices of Indigenous guardians, and will provide a platform for civil society groups, the private sector, policy-makers, local authorities and youth to discuss and explore processes that draw from Indigenous peoples and local communities’ knowledge to generate scalable solutions to contemporary challenges. These solutions will be rooted in reciprocity, will help to achieve human and ecological well-being, and will promote just and sustainable decision-making that restores harmony between people and nature.
Find this session’s white paper here.
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Jennifer Tauli Corpuz
Global Policy and Advocacy Lead , Nia Tero
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Joji Carino
Senior Policy Advisor , Forest Peoples Programme
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Dominique Bikaba
Founder and Executive Director , Strong Roots Congo
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David Hernández Palmar
Filmmaker, independent curator and film programmer from the IIPUANA Clan, Venezuela
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Gerardo Macuna Miraña
Leader, Yaigoje Apaporis Indigenous Territory
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Mandy Bayha
Sahtúgot’ine mother
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Myrna Cunningham
Ex Board member, Association for Women’s Rights in Development (AWID)
Two days of dialogue and debate will compel participants to get ready for a strong call to global action. But what action is most urgently needed? So many of us are pleading for transformative change – but what does this require? Experts will discuss the need for a fundamental, system-wide change across technological, economic and social factors, including changing paradigms, goals and values. To achieve this, we must move away from looking at biodiversity as a production factor to seeing it as an integral part of life, without which we cannot survive. Moving from an economy of exploitation to an economy of restoration will require individual and collective behavioural change.
The Closing Plenary will be opened by Elizabeth Mrema, Executive Secretary of the CBD and will start with a conversation between Christiane Paulus, Director General at BMU, Carla Montesi, Director at DEVCO and Carlos Rodriguez, CEO of GEF, before moving to a dynamic panel of representatives from youth, government, business, civil society and indigenous people.
Participants will join the discussion and contribute to the transformative change which we will initiate here.
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Christiane Paulus
Director General, Nature Conservation and Sustainable Use of Natural Resources, German Ministry for Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety (BMUV)
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Elizabeth Mrema
Assistant Secretary-General and Deputy Executive Director, UN Environment Programme (UNEP)
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Carla Montesi
Director , European Commission’s Directorate General for Development and Cooperation
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Carlos Manuel Rodriguez
CEO and Chairperson, Global Environment Facility
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Melina Sakiyama
Co-Founder, Global Youth Biodiversity Network (GYBN)
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Yvonne Aki Sawyerr
Mayor of Freetown , Sierra Leone
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Mwambu Wanendeya
CEO and Founder, Carico
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Peter Daszak
President, EcoHealth Alliance
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Benki Piyãko
Asháninka Community Leader, Terra Kampa do Rio Amônia
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Robert Nasi
Chief Operating Officer, CIFOR-ICRAF Director General, CIFOR, CIFOR-ICRAF, CIFOR
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Rodrigo A. Medellin
Senior Professor, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
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Khairani Barokka
Writer, poet and artist, NYU Tisch Departmental Fellow
Join us for an informal facilitated networking session. Guided by conversational menus you will have the opportunity to connect with fellow conference participants in short breakout sessions of 10 minutes each. These sessions are limited to 1,000 participants, on a first come, first served basis.
Takayna/Tarkine in northwestern Tasmania is home to one of the last tracts of old-growth rainforest in the world, yet it’s currently at the mercy of destructive extraction industries, including logging and mining. This documentary, presented by Patagonia Films, unpacks the complexities of modern conservation and challenges us to consider the importance of our last wild places.
Visit the digital exhibition booths, brought to you by leading environmental and grassroots organizations. Connect and learn with 25 booths, open 24/7. In Whova, under Exhibitions.
28 October 2020
Agriculture is the main income source for most rural households in Asia and the Pacific region. However, the increasing biodiversity loss due to climate change represents a huge threat to people’s livelihoods, the consequences of which could be even more dangerous than the COVID-19 pandemic. To promote youth engagement in biodiversity protection toward achieving the UN 2030 Sustainable Development Goals, this Youth Daily Show – led by Young Professionals for Agricultural Development (YPARD) in collaboration with the Youth in Landscapes Initiative (YIL) – will explore what young Indigenous people working in agriculture are doing to preserve biodiversity
Join us for an informal facilitated networking session. Guided by conversational menus you will have the opportunity to connect with fellow conference participants in short breakout sessions of 10 minutes each. These sessions are limited to 1,000 participants, on a first come, first served basis.
Visit the digital exhibition booths, brought to you by leading environmental and grassroots organizations. Connect and learn with 25 booths, open 24/7. In Whova, under Exhibitions.
Biodiversity is already a well-recognized element of sustainable forest management (SFM). The role of forests in maintaining biodiversity is also explicitly recognized by the UN Strategic Plan for Forests 2017-2030. The purpose of this session is to discuss the state of mainstreaming biodiversity in the forest sector, take stock of existing concepts and tools for integrating biodiversity in forest management and make recommendations for future actions. The results of the discussion will inform the research of FTA as well as preparatory work towards the implementation of FAO’s Strategy on Biodiversity Mainstreaming across Agricultural Sectors.
The COVID-19 pandemic highlights the power zoonoses have to disrupt our economies, public health and food systems. In response to this, One Health has grown as an approach for addressing the current inadequacies in responses to such global health crises, as well as playing an important role in addressing and mitigating climate change and biodiversity loss. This panel will highlight why those promoting a landscape approach should pay greater attention to landscape health and its relationship with animal (livestock and wildlife) and human health, as part of an integrated One Health approach. If landscape policies and investments continue to be made without taking into account a One Health lens, they will miss opportunities to contribute to addressing the biggest challenges of our time.
The zoonotic origins of COVID 19 and countries’ reactions to the pandemic raise important questions about the future of protected areas. First, does the threat of virus spillover events after all call for a stricter separation of nature and people despite all justified criticism of fortress conservation approaches? Second, how can conservation funding cope with dumps in international wildlife tourism? We will discuss these questions in the format of a digital roundtable with experts in protected areas from different backgrounds. We will include practical examples of the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on protected areas and aim to provide policy-oriented conclusions that could feed into the protected areas work at the upcoming IUCN World Conservation Congress and CBD COP 15.
Find this session’s white paper here.
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Anna Spenceley
Board Member, Global Sustainable Tourism Council
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Adrian Martin
Professor, School of International Development, University of East Anglia
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Herbert Lust
Senior Vice President of Global Public Partnerships and Senior Vice President and Managing Director, Conservation International Europe
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Maricela Fernández
Indigenous Cabécar leader
The environment, climate change, biodiversity, health, the economy – we face multiple crises. Deforestation and ecosystem degradation have not lost their momentum – we are losing biodiversity fast, reducing our ability to use land-based solutions. Mono-causal solutions have not worked for these interconnected problems. This interactive and informative session will invite the audience to learn and explore, with experts from science and indigenous peoples, how to deliver a green, just recovery: How are biodiversity and climate change linked? How can rights-based approaches protect and fully restore ecological functionality? Which policy processes and finances are needed? Where are the priorities?
Artifishal is a film about people, rivers, and the fight for the future of wild fish and the environment that supports them. It explores wild salmon’s slide toward extinction, threats posed by fish hatcheries and fish farms, and our continued loss of faith in nature.
Years from now, historians will be discussing the reality we are living and the tomorrow we are defining. What will they call this age? The age of climate denial, the age of biodiversity loss or could it possible be the age of collective action? In a critical moment for the planet and all its peoples, the IPBES 2019 Global Assessment Report on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services, suggest that we all get on the train of Transformative Change – a profound, fundamental, system-wide and strategic change in discourses, actions, values and policy.
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Swetha Stotra Bhashyam
The Global South Focal Point, The Global Youth Biodiversity Network (GYBN)
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Simangele Msweli
The Steering Committee, The Global Youth Biodiversity Network
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Josefa Cariño Taulí
The Steering Committee, The Global Youth Biodiversity Network (GYBN
Aware of the critical state of degradation of ecosystems worldwide, on 1 March 2019, under Resolution 73/284, the United Nations General Assembly proclaimed 2021 – 2030 to be the United Nations Decade on Ecosystem Restoration. The resolution calls for supporting and scaling up efforts to prevent, halt and reverse the degradation of ecosystems worldwide, as well as to raise awareness of the importance of ecosystem restoration. UNEP and FAO are the lead implementing UN agencies of the Decade and therefore, to support its implementation, a Task Force on Best Practices (TF) has been established involving a group of 85 individuals from 32 global leading organizations in the field of knowledge capitalization and dissemination. Led by FAO, this group is in charge of setting the ground for future efforts on knowledge capitalization and dissemination as well as the identification of new knowledge products, proposing an action plan for scientific research over the course of the Decade.
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Christophe Besacier
Senior Forestry Officer, Forest and Landscape Restoration Mechanism Forestry Division, FAO
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Faustine Zoveda
Forestry Officer, Forest and Landscape Restoration Mechanism Forestry Division , Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)
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Vera Boerger
Senior Land and Water Officer, Land and Water Division (NSL) , FAO
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Kathleen Buckingham
Senior Manager, Social Research, Data and Innovation, Global Restoration Initiative, World Resources Institute
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Robin Chazdon
Research and Consultant, Forestoration International
Once, conservation organizations and multilateral institutions regarded many remote indigenous and rural cultures as groups requiring relocation or “development” according to Western parameters. The 21st century has seen a burgeoning awareness that neither alternative is desirable. Nonetheless, there exists a relative dearth of examples of how best to partner with these increasingly imperiled communities to help protect their forests and their cultures as modernity presses in on all sides. This session focuses on successful efforts in northern Amazonia to help forest communities seize control of their destinies while developing a broader governance vision for indigenous stewardship that emphasizes nonlinear economies.
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Mark J. Plotkin
President and Board member , Amazon Conservation Team
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Carolina Gil
Northwest Amazon Regional Director, Amazon Conservation Team
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María del Rosario “Charito” Chicunque
Kamentsa indigenous leader and traditional healer
The session will launch the White Paper and Policy Brief “Build Back Better in a post-COVID world – Reducing future wildlife-borne spillover of disease to humans” produced by the Sustainable Wildlife Management Programme. Presenters will discuss alternative strategies to tackle the drivers of zoonotic disease emergence and their spread along wildlife value chains. They will emphasize the need to consider and involve the millions of citizens, communities and Indigenous People who rely on wildlife for food, income and cultural identity. Discussions will focus on how to encourage policy dialogue and coordinated targeted investments to prevent, detect and respond to future pandemics.
- Philippe Mayaux, Head of sector Biodiversity and ecosystem services – Directorate-General for International Cooperation and Development (DG DEVCO) – European Commission
- Michelle Edgardine Ngwapaza, Deputy General Director and National focal point for the SWM Programme in Gabon – Wildlife and Protected Areas General Directorate (DGFAP), Ministry of waters, forests, sea and environment, in charge of Climate Plan and Land Use Plan – Republic of Gabon (Central Africa)
- Nickolas Fredericks, Current Toshao (indigenous village chief) for Shulinab village. Current chairman of the National Toshaos Council, the highest representative body for Indigenous Peoples in Guyana
- Nathalie van Vliet, Associate researcher – Site Coordinator SWM Programme Guyana – CIFOR
- Amanda Fine, Associate Director, Wildlife Health Programme WCS
- Marisa Peyre, Deputy Head ASTRE research unit – CIRAD
- Keith Sumption, Chief Veterinary Officer and Leader of the Animal Health Programme at FAO Director of the Joint Centre for Zoonoses and Anti-Microbial Resistance (CJWZ)
Find this session’s white paper here.
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Maria Helena Semedo
Deputy Director-General and Chair , Collaborative Partnership on Forests, FAO
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Philippe Mayaux
Head of sector Biodiversity and ecosystem services - Directorate-General for International Cooperation and Development (DG DEVCO), European Commission
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Michelle Edgardine Ngwapaza
Deputy General Director & National focal point for the SWM Programme in Gabon - Wildlife and Protected Areas General Directorate (DGFAP), Ministry of waters, forests, sea and environment, in charge of Climate Plan and Land Use Plan – Republic of Gabon (Central Africa)
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Nickolas Fredericks
Current Toshao (indigenous village chief) for Shulinab village. Current chairman of the National Toshaos Council, the highest representative body for Indigenous Peoples in Guyana , Current chairman for the South Rupununi District Council (a representative body for the 21 Southern Rupununi indigenous communities)
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Amanda Fine
Associate Director, Wildlife Health Programme WCS
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Marisa Peyre
Deputy Head, ASTRE research unit, CIRAD
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Keith Sumption
Chief Veterinary Officer and Leader of the Animal Health Programme at FAO , Director of the Joint Centre for Zoonoses and Anti-Microbial Resistance (CJWZ)
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Cristelle Pratt
Assistant Secretary-General, Department of Environment and Climate Action, Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States
Our global food systems depend on agrobiodiversity – that is, the vast diversity of crops, trees and livestock that underpins our entire agricultural system, make it less vulnerable to pests and diseases, and contribute to landscape restoration and resilience in the midst of the climate crisis. Through Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) Target 2.5, we have pledged to ensure the conservation and sustainable use of all our agrobiodiversity by 2020. However, even though we have made significant strides towards hitting the target, we are still far from implementation.
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Charlotte Lusty
Head of Programmes, Global Crop Diversity Trust
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Desterio Nyamongo
Senior Principal Research Officer and Director, Genetic Resources Research Institute Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organization
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Lavernee Gueco
Researcher - College of Agriculture and Food Science , University of Los Banos - The Philippines
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Vania Azevedo
Head, Genebank, ICRISAT
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Nelissa Jamora
Agricultural Economist
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Maarten van Zonneveld
Genebank Manager, World Vegetable Center
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Filippo Bassi
Senior Scientist, International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas
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Alejandro Argumedo
Program Director, Asociación ANDES
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Shivali Sharma
Theme Leader, Pre-breeding; and Senior Scientist – Genetic Resources at ICRISAT-Hyderabad
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Maria Andrade
Scientist and World Food Prize Laureate, International Potato Center
Peatlands, a Super Nature Based Solution (Spanish audio)
Peatlands, a Super Nature Based Solution (French audio)
This session will take you on a two-part peatlands journey to some of the most rare, remote and unique places in the world. Many peatlands offer a safe haven for rare and threatened biodiversity – from the orangutan of Indonesia to the golden sphagnum moss of Northern Ireland. Transport yourself to the remote forested swamps of the Congo Basin and then onward to the tip of the South American continent. Peatlands also offer vital stopping-off points for migratory species – connecting species to special places across the globe. Peatlands can also be carbon-packed micro-rainforests that house bizarre creatures and tales of the past. UNEP invites you to discover why peatlands are a critical habitat for biodiversity and what they offer to our climate and our health. This world tour will provide examples and share experiences and strategies, while highlighting the important role that partnerships can play in safeguarding biodiversity.
Find this session’s white paper here.
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Arlette Soudan-Nonault
Minister of Environment and Tourism, Republic of Congo
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Gabriel Quijandría Acosta
Vice Minister, Strategic Development of Natural Resources, Peru
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Musonda Mumba
Secretary General , Convention on Wetlands
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Alue Dohong
Vice Minister, Ministry Environment and Forestry, Republic of Indonesia
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Kristine Tompkins
Cofounder and president, Tompkins Conservation, UN Patron of Protected Areas
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Ifo Suspense
Marien Ngouabi University, Republic of Congo
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Franziska Tanneberger
Head , Greifswald Mire Centre
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Tina Claffey
Award winning nature photographer
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Hans Schutten
Programme Head , Climate-smart Land Use of Wetlands International
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Amy Fraenkel
Executive Secretary , Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS)
To implement the Post-2020 Biodiversity Framework, a major challenge will be to customize and redesign financial instruments to ensure that investment plans are evaluated for their potential risk to nature, or to create incentives for biodiversity-friendly investment into value chains. The session will bring together expert practitioners from the public and private sectors in multiple continents to discuss existing approaches in the field of financial instruments, good practices and lessons learned, as well as how to bring successful approaches to scale and how to link COVID-19 response measures to financing for a biodiversity-friendly future.
Find this session’s white paper here.
The triple challenge is the imperative to simultaneously deliver a stable climate, recovering biodiversity and healthy food for 10 billion people by 2050. Building on discussions at the GLF Bonn in June, this event advances thinking on the concept further, and explores the implications through a deep dive into the case of the Greater Virunga Landscape. In the Virunga landscape this triple challenge looms large, as does the risk of disease transmission between both wildlife and humans, making the One Health approach essential. The discussion will combine speakers from the landscape with external experts and the audience to explore how to negotiate and balance these challenges.
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Gary Tabor
President, Centre for Large Landscapes Conservation
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David Duli
Country Director, WWF Uganda
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Will Baldwin-Cantello
Chief Adviser on Forests, WWF-UK
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Anna Behm Masozera
Director, International Gorilla Conservation Programme
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Ruth Edma Mwizeere
Environmental Scientist and Activist
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Beatrice Kabihogo
Founder and team leader, Uplift the Rural Poor
The COVID pandemic has brought new attention to the importance of landscape health for human health in addition to economic resilience. The transfer of zoonotic diseases from animals to humans makes clear the interdependence of human and animal health on terrestrial ecosystems, and the risks of ecosystem degradation due to human activity. Healthy landscapes are also critical for healthy economies, providing essential ecosystem services such as water, fertile soil, and erosion prevention. In many places, nature and wildlife provide the basis for nature-based tourism (NBT) that provides important income for protected area management and for jobs for local communities.
This session will look at pathways for spillover of zoonotic diseases such as COVID-19 from animals to humans, what actions can manage or stop spill over and how a One Health approach that looks at human, animal and environmental health together can make a difference. The session will also explore tools that can help bring back NBT as the world recovers from COVID-19, how restoration is important to human health, and how approaches to landscape management are evolving to encompass health considerations.
29 October 2020
Join us for an informal facilitated networking session. Guided by conversational menus you will have the opportunity to connect with fellow conference participants in short breakout sessions of 10 minutes each. These sessions are limited to 1,000 participants, on a first come, first served basis.
Visit the digital exhibition booths, brought to you by leading environmental and grassroots organizations. Connect and learn with 25 booths, open 24/7. In Whova, under Exhibitions.
Rangelands (grassland, savannahs and silvo-pastoral systems) in dry areas and mountains account for the largest global restoration opportunities for ecosystems, human and environmental health, and economic growth.
Integrated landscape approaches feature prominently in recent UN conventions as promoted strategies to address inter-connected social, political, economic and environmental challenges in tropical frontier landscapes. However, evidence of their effectiveness remains poorly researched, reported and understood. This session will address this gap through a book launch that showcases COLANDS initiatives that are implementing integrated landscape approaches in Ghana, Zambia, and Indonesia. Speakers will share their experiences of conceptualizing, designing and implementing landscape approaches, including: why biodiversity needs to be integrated within landscape approaches, how better governance can be achieved, what evaluation approaches are appropriate and how to bridge sectorial, disciplinary and knowledge system divides.
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Eric Bayala
PhD Candidate, University of Amsterdam and CIFOR
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Joli Rumi Borah
Post-doc researcher, University of British Columbia
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Colas Chervier
Scientist, CIRAD
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Valentinus Heri
Director, Riak Bumi
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Terry Sunderland
University of British Columbia
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James Reed
Researcher, Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR)
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Mirjam Ros-Tonen
Associate professor at the Department of Social Geography, Planning & International Development Studies, University of Amsterdam
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Samuel Adeyanju
Environmental sustainability professional
Journey to Malaysian Borneo with The Borneo Project to learn about the rare wildlife of this unique island and see how local communities are involved in documenting and maintaining forest health! Join Fi, Bryan, Shahnaz, and Jettie on an exploration of the rainforests of the Baram River Basin to learn about a community-led project to document the endemic species of this ecosystem. This extraordinary, remote land is home to the Orang Ulu, which roughly means “people of the interior”, a term that includes many different indigenous groups. Together we will discuss how community-led forest protection is an essential tool in maintaining biodiversity, and we will even see some of the rare species that have evolved to suit this particular climate. It’s everything you could want from an exotic eco-tour, minus the mosquitos and humidity!
The Hindu Kush Himalayan (HKH) region extends across eight countries from Afghanistan in the west to Myanmar in the east, crossing Pakistan, India, China, Nepal, Bhutan and Bangladesh. It is a globally important resource – biologically and culturally rich, it provides ecosystem goods and services to a quarter of the world’s population. The HKH is the Pulse of the Planet – what happens here affects the rest of the world. This session will explain why the HKH is the Pulse of the Planet and the need to reinforce positive relations between biodiversity, landscapes, culture and health in a post-COVID ‘new normal’.
The new CBD Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) will build on a theory of change aiming for transformative shifts and involving the whole of society. Landscape-based initiatives and approaches across the globe have evidenced the potential contribution of non-state actors in achieving global goals. Landscape governance arrangements are complementary to existing CBD approaches, and align with the GBF objectives. This session will highlight and discuss the role of landscape approaches and arrangements undertaken by non-state actors to support the GBF, discuss how policies could support this and illustrate the potential for area-based non-state actor GBF commitments and verification.
Knowledge products:
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Marcel Kok
Programme leader, International Biodiversity Policy, PBL Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency
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Johan Meijer
Researcher, PBL Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency
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John Ajjugo
Policy analyst , HoAREC&N - African Landscapes Dialogue
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Maiko Nishi
Research fellow, Satoyama Initiative - United Nations University
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Nina Bhola
Senior programme officer, UNEP-WCMC
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Sophie Persey
Senior Programme Manager, LandScale, Rainforest Alliance
Humanity’s destruction of biodiversity creates the perfect conditions for diseases like COVID-19 to emerge. Our lives depend on protecting our forests – not only to prevent future pandemics but also to reverse the impacts of catastrophic climate change. Indigenous communities in Sarawak are hard at work applying local solutions to these immense global challenges by protecting some of the richest tropical rainforests on earth. In this session, learn from grassroots leaders about what Indigenous-managed forest protection looks like on the ground: from investing in village-led research, mapping and forest management, to cancelling the construction of the second largest mega-dam of its kind in the world.
Business, the environment and society need to be addressed simultaneously if we are to achieve economic and ecological restoration and a future balance.
Coffee is the second most traded commodity in the world and Uganda, the world’s 6th largest exporter, is home to almost 20% of the world’s coffee smallholding farmers. In Bugisu, on Mount Elgon, the farmers live remotely at high altitude adjacent to a UNESCO Man & Biosphere Reserve. A spiral of worsening deforestation in tandem with aggressive climate events of worsening flash floods and landslides is occurring and is at a point where their last economic activity – coffee farming, is at risk.
Small businesses can experiment in business models and CARICO Café has worked with these communities using their coffee livelihood holistically as a socio-economic-ecological lever. Despite improving quality and yield, driving end-consumer knowledge of origin, livelihoods remain poor.
The session will discuss the value of holistic triple levers to address the challenge of reversal and restoration of biodiversity.
Find this session’s white paper here.
As we proceed through the 21st century and confront today’s biodiversity crisis, we on one hand realize how intertwined our well-being is with our biodiversity and ecosystem health, and on the other hand, we find ourselves immersed in a globalized urban cultural dimension detached from our roots.
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Tisha Ramadhin
Community Relations , Fairventures Worldwide FVW Indonesia
For hundreds of generations, the Gwich’in people of Alaska and northern Canada have depended on the caribou that migrate through the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. With their traditional culture now threatened by oil extraction and climate change, two Gwich’in women are continuing a decades-long fight to protect their land and future.
The Arctic Refuge is home to lands and wildlife vital for the subsistence way of life of Alaska Native communities; and it serves a vital role as a remaining link with the unspoiled natural world and a source of hope for future generations, even for those who may never set foot there.
The Trump administration is proceeding with plans to give oil and gas companies the right to drill in the coastal plain of the Arctic Refuge. Drilling will destroy intact wilderness and violate the human rights of the Gwich’in, who rely on this sacred place to sustain their culture and w
This session will highlight the need for recognition of the contributions of mixed, diverse agricultural/agrarian landscapes – not only to biodiversity conservation, but also to the development of more resilient food systems to respond to challenges like those that the world is currently facing. Global policies, such as those of the CBD, have conventionally seen agriculture as a threat to biodiversity. Hence, responses have often focused on promoting the protection of natural ecosystems by concentrating efforts on preventing further expansion of agriculture. We argue that the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework will be seriously flawed if it fails to tackle the effect of food systems and agriculture on biodiversity, or fails to bring farmers into the alliance towards biodiversity conservation and sustainable production. ICRAF and GIZ are the main organizing partners for this session. The CBD Secretariat, IUCN, national representatives, a representative of the private sector and a farmers’ representative will also participate.
Find this session’s white paper here.
This session will discuss how jurisdictions with sustainability commitments can restore biodiversity and ecosystem values through a nature-based economy that enhances the value of local sustainable products and services sourced from healthy ecological areas. Representatives from government, civil society, community and the private sector will discuss progress in building a nature-based economy through jurisdictional approaches at the district level in Indonesia. To harness global support for LTKL member districts, the panel brings perspectives from partners working in Southeast Asia and Latin America. Insights from this panel will inform other jurisdictions embarking on similar journeys. The session will close by launching the first LTKL jurisdictional profile for Sintang district.
Find this session’s white paper here.
Since 2007, the Central African Forest Observatory (OFAC) has been working to create information networks, establish analytical and communication tools, and produce flagship regional publications to provide reliable, relevant and accessible data on the state of Central Africa’s forests.
The session will interactively present the different tools available for policymakers, researchers, NGOs, donors, private sector and students working in the region to obtain information related to biodiversity and forest management.
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Florence Palla
Regional coordinator , OFAC support project (RIOFAC)
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Donald Djossi
Data management analyst , COMIFAC
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Quentin Jungers
Technical Assistant , OFAC Information System (RIOFAC)
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Tanya Merceron
Regional coordinator , BIOPAMA-IUCN program
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Richard Eba'a Atyi
Senior Scientist and Hub Leader, CIFOR
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Raymond Ndomba Ngoye
Executive Secretary, Central African Forest Commission (COMIFAC)
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Philippe Mayaux
Head of sector Biodiversity and ecosystem services - Directorate-General for International Cooperation and Development (DG DEVCO), European Commission
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Honoré Tabuna
Commissioner for the Environment, Natural Resources, Agriculture and Rural Development, Economic Community, Central African States (CEEAC)
Depuis 2007, l’Observatoire des forêts d’Afrique centrale (OFAC) agit pour créer des réseaux d’information, mettre en place des outils d’analyse et de communication, et produire des publications régionales pour fournir des données fiables, pertinentes et accessibles sur l’état des forêts d’Afrique centrale.
La session présentera de manière interactive les différents outils disponibles pour les décideurs, les chercheurs, les ONG, les bailleurs, le secteur privé et les étudiants engagés dans la région pour obtenir des informations relatives à la biodiversité et à la gestion des forêts.
The Amazon, the Earth’s largest and most diverse rainforest, biodiversity hotspot and home to many indigenous communities, is on fire. The majority of these fires are not wildfires – they are ignited and can often be traced back to illegal forest clearing to create land for monocultures and support the increasing demand for commodities such as soy, coffee, cocoa and palm oil. Fires are just one of the impacts that monocultures have on the Amazons. During this Youth Daily Show, the Youth in Landscapes Initiative discusses with young experts from the Latin America Region the impacts of monocultures on the health of the local ecosystem and its biodiversity, as well as the health and food security of local communities.
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Heitor Mancini Teixeira
Researcher, Wageningen University & Research
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Débora Lima
Post doctorate researcher , University of São Paulo, Brazil
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Carla Madueno
Ecologist , YIL Alumni Representative
Growing food and fiber with industrial techniques has devastated our climate. Conventional agriculture contributes up to 25% of the emissions driving the climate crisis. But there’s another way. Regenerative organic methods can build healthy soil which helps draw carbon back in the ground.
Because healthy soil traps carbon, many believe that regenerative organic farming methods have the potential to change the way we grow food and fiber and restore the health of our soil and climate. These practices help build healthy soil that could help draw down more carbon from the atmosphere than conventional methods. Regenerative organic agriculture could be a viable way to help stop climate change before it’s too late.
The New York Declaration on Forests (NYDF) aims to halt natural forest loss by 2030, contributing to climate, biodiversity, and sustainable development goals. The session will cover the findings of the 2020 NYDF Assessment on extractive industries and infrastructure. A panel discussion will address the urgent need for transforming approaches to planning and implementing large-scale development projects and the role of forests and the NYDF post-2020. The discussion will focus on promoting transparency and accountability in mining and infrastructure sectors; safeguarding Indigenous peoples’ rights; building incentives for responsible sourcing; and reshaping the NYDF and international commitments.
Read the White Paper here.
Rewilding is a new, (pro)active approach to biodiversity conservation. Restoring ecosystems is key to our public health and mental well-being, and vital in the fight against climate change and mass extinction. The goal of this session is to discuss and promote sound models of rewilding, in order to reach and maintain a favourable level of health for habitats and species. Can we bring back natural processes while promoting socio-economic development and supporting rural communities? In this session, we share experiences with rewilding projects, and look at possible funding and income-generating mechanisms that contribute to healthy, life-supporting landscapes and rural development.
Find this session’s white paper here.
Biological diversity celebrates its 3.7 billionth birthday this year. From common ancestors, all forms of life sprang up from a few grams of the same chemical building blocks. But “biodiversity” as a word is only 35 years’ old this year having been coined by E.O. Wilson and other ecologists in 1985. The term “biodiversity” is now co-owned by scientists, politicians, philanthropists and civil society – but has only recently become a priority of the corporate sector and private investors.
Biodiversity is a bit nebulous. Few convincing answers are evident for the commercial world on questions such as: what are the most important assets of biodiversity and what is the return on investment in biodiversity? At the same time, businesses do understand emerging risks and liabilities if biodiversity is ignored. We have not adequately answered the related question on how can business and biodiversity mutually benefit each other? Resilient Landscapes seeks to answer that question in agricultural and forest landscapes through engaging with interested private sector and investment actors.
Today, agriculture accounts for 70% of the projected loss of terrestrial biodiversity. It contributes to 50% of the topsoil lost. We use 40% of Earth’s land surface to produce food, making it the single largest cause of deforestation, habitat and biodiversity loss. Yet with the world’s population rising, we will need to double food production by 2050. Given the arable land available, current “business as usual” models are insufficient.
At the same time, half of the world’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP), €40 trillion, depends on nature.[1] The world already loses an estimated €5.5-10.5 trillion per year from land degradation and biodiversity loss further puts our food systems and nutrition at risk[2].
Addressing the current biodiversity crisis is crucial to planetary and ecological health. Preliminary research indicates that significant biodiversity loss results in a greater transmissibility of human diseases, which can be seen from a substantial increase in zoonosis, including SARS, Ebola, Lyme and COVID-19. In doing so, public-private partnerships will play a crucial role in supporting commitment to action toward financing biodiversity.
Furthermore, there is growing recognition that public funds are insufficient to reverse biodiversity loss. A report recently released by the Paulson Institute shows that the funding gap for biodiversity is $700 billion per year for the next decade. The financial sector has a critical role in addressing the global biodiversity crisis, while governments and regulators hold the key to harnessing the power of the financial sector to mobilize private finance at scale to protect nature[3].
[1] EU Biodiversity Strategy for 2030
[2] EU Biodiversity Strategy for 2030
[3] Mobilizing Private Finance for Nature, World Bank Group Report
Introduction & Welcome remarks: Leona Liu, Deputy-Director, Resilient Landscapes (03:00)
Keynote Address by Video: Prof. Thomas Lovejoy, University Professor of Environmental Science and Policy of George Mason University (02:17)
Keynote Address: Gonzalo Munoz, COP25 High-Level Champion – (03:00)
Panel One: Natural Capital Appreciation
Moderator Introductions: Christopher Knowles, Senior Advisor, Environment & Climate Finance
Resilient Landscapes (05:00)
Facilitated Panel: Supporting biodiversity and resilient landscapes through innovative finance mechanisms
1. Jaspreet Stamm, Director, Finance in Motion (05:00)
2. Andre van den Beld, Head Sustainability – Cocoa at Export Trading Group (ETG) (05:00)
3. Martin Geiger, Director Sustainability and Corporate Governance, DEG Deutsche Investitions- und Entwicklungsgesellschaft mbH (05:00)
4. Fabian Huwlyer, Founding Partner, Posaidon Capital(05:00)
Closing Remarks & Transition to Panel Two: Christopher Knowles, Senior Advisor, Environment & Climate Finance, Resilient Landscapes (03:00)
Panel Two: Supply Chains & Biodiversity in the post COVID-19 Era
Moderator Introductions: Howard-Yana Shapiro, Senior Advisor, Private Sector & Markets, Resilient Landscapes, Distinguished Senior Fellow, CIFOR-ICRAF (05:00)
Facilitated Panel: Biodiversity & Agricultural Landscapes
1. Jason Clay, Senior Vice President, Markets, Executive Director, Markets Institute, WWF (05:00)
Topics: 1. Nexus between biodiversity and resilient landscapes; 2. Improvement of certification through the new Agricultural Performance System
2. Susan Chomba, Project Manager, Regreening Africa, World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) (05:00)
Topics: 1. Re-greening Africa and the new Agricultural Performance System; 2. Biodiversity & Resilient Landscapes
3. Mette Wilkie, Director, Forestry Division, FAO (05:00)
Topics: 1. Value of forests in terms of benefits to livelihoods; 2. FAO’s SOFO 2020 and the need for the call to action on biodiversity efforts
Closing remarks: Tony Simons, Director General, World Agroforestry (ICRAF) , Executive Director, CIFOR-ICRAF (05:00)
Join us for an informal facilitated networking session. Guided by conversational menus you will have the opportunity to connect with fellow conference participants in short breakout sessions of 10 minutes each. These sessions are limited to 1,000 participants, on a first come, first served basis.
Takayna/Tarkine in northwestern Tasmania is home to one of the last tracts of old-growth rainforest in the world, yet it’s currently at the mercy of destructive extraction industries, including logging and mining. This documentary, presented by Patagonia Films, unpacks the complexities of modern conservation and challenges us to consider the importance of our last wild places.
Visit the digital exhibition booths, brought to you by leading environmental and grassroots organizations. Connect and learn with 25 booths, open 24/7. In Whova, under Exhibitions.
28 October 2020
The variety of life on Earth is being lost at an unprecedented rate. Now more than ever, the health of our planet requires us to recognize our complex, interdependent relationships with nature. During this opening plenary, keynote speakers will interact with the online community to frame the wicked problems of biodiversity loss alongside land degradation, climate change and the emergence of zoonotic pandemics. We kick off the conference with a call for a One Health approach, spotlighting the essential role of biodiversity and setting the scene for building back better.
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Ashok Sridharan
Mayor of Bonn, President of ICLEI – Local Governments for Sustainability
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Jay Griffiths
Award winning author, Advocate of nature
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Elizabeth Mrema
Assistant Secretary-General and Deputy Executive Director, UN Environment Programme (UNEP)
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Shahid Naeem
E3B Professor, Chair of the Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Environmental Biology, Colombia University
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Laura H. Kahn
Physician and Research Scholar, Program on Science and Global Security at the Princeton University School of Public and International Affairs
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Yolanda Kakabadse Navarro
Former Minister of Environment for Ecuador
This participatory plenary will be framed around the post-2020 global biodiversity framework, the Paris climate goals and the UN Decade of Ecosystem Restoration, all of which call on the global community to ‘bend the curve’ on these critical issues. Key global policy makers, scientists as well as business and community leaders will inform the audience about plans in place for the new decade, and engage in critical discussion. Through constructive debate, we will explore how the new policy frameworks can spark a vivid societal dialogue, consolidate next steps and pave the way for direct global action from individuals, civil society, local authorities and the global business community.
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Musonda Mumba
Secretary General , Convention on Wetlands
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Sir Robert Watson
Head of the scientific advisory group for the UNEP Global Assessments Synthesis Report
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H.E. Fekadu Beyene Aleka
Commissioner, Environment, Forest and Climate Change Commission of Ethiopia
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Niria Alicia Garcia
Indigenous leader and innovator, UN Young Champion of the Earth finalist
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Johan Rockström
Director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research , Professor in Earth System Science at the University of Potsdam
Agricultural supply chains are the leading driver of deforestation globally, contributing to the depletion of biodiversity and natural ecosystems. In this plenary, the audience will get an inside look at the interrelation between finance for biodiversity and sustainable land use and healthy landscapes and sustainable, inclusive value chains. A discussion among experts will place local communities at the heart of the discussion while exploring the innovative financial instruments that are needed to spark a bioeconomy, grounded in the rights and expertise of local communities.
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Maria Amália Souza
Founder & Strategic Development Director, Fundo Casa Socio Ambiental
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Priya Shyamsundar
Lead Economist, The Nature Conservancy
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Jennifer Pryce
President and CEO, Calvert Impact Capital
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Martin Berg
Climate Asset Management
The session will envisage what the next steps should be for SDG 2.5 in the post-2020 Agenda. Where do we go from here? It will seek to demonstrate why agrobiodiversity is essential to ensure food and nutrition security for current and future global populations. The greater the diversity, the more resilient the system. Protecting crops and livestock from pests and disease, and ensuring they have improved resistance to increasing climatic shocks is essential. But how do we get there?
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Danielle Nierenberg
President and Co-Founder, Food Tank
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Sir Peter Crane
Board Chair and President, Oak Spring Garden Foundation
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Marie Haga
Associate Vice President for External Relations and Governance, IFAD
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Kent Nnadozie
Secretary, International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture
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Susan Bragdon
Policy Advisor, Oxfam Novib
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Mildred Crawford
Caribbean Network of Rural Women Producers, Farmers Co-Chair of the Executive Committee of the Global Assembly of Partners towards Habitat III (GAP)
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Tina Claffey
Award winning nature photographer
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Pablo Vargas
CEO , Britt
In Latin America, multiple drivers are putting pressure on biodiversity and natural ecosystems. This plenary will build on the issues raised in the ‘Financing Diversity’ plenary to shed light on opportunities and challenges to sustainable climate finance in the Amazon basin and the Latin American region at large. The debate will speak to financial innovations at the intersection of biodiversity and climate action and explore the initiatives and instruments needed to achieve a bio-economy that is truly based on nature’s richness, is gender–inclusive, and is grounded in the rights and expertise of Indigenous Peoples.
The two-part discussion will primarily be held in Portuguese and Spanish, with English translation.
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Marina Campos
Founder and Executive Director, Conexsus - US
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Marianella Feoli
Executive Director, Fundecooperacion for Sustainable Development
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Elcio Machinery
Coordinator, Coordination of the Indigenous Organizations of the Brazilian Amazon (COIAB)
In Latin America, multiple drivers are putting pressure on biodiversity and natural ecosystems. This plenary will build on the issues raised in the ‘Financing Diversity’ plenary to shed light on opportunities and challenges to sustainable climate finance in the Amazon basin and the Latin American region at large. The debate will speak to financial innovations at the intersection of biodiversity and climate action and explore the initiatives and instruments needed to achieve a bio-economy that is truly based on nature’s richness, is gender–inclusive, and is grounded in the rights and expertise of Indigenous Peoples.
The two-part discussion will primarily be held in Portuguese and Spanish, with English translation.
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Marina Campos
Founder and Executive Director, Conexsus - US
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Marianella Feoli
Executive Director, Fundecooperacion for Sustainable Development
29 October 2020
While the world seems to get further entangled in a web of concurrent crises, there are a growing number of leaders and experts who are sparking new hope and trust in the future. GLF took the effort to find the experts sharing their visions on the state of biodiversity and gathered them in a single digital space to share their inspirational knowledge. Don’t miss this unique opportunity to listen in, learn and get inspired on why biodiversity is essential to building back better.
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Carole Dieschbourg
Minister for the Environment, Climate and Sustainable Development of Luxembourg
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Robert Nasi
Chief Operating Officer, CIFOR-ICRAF Director General, CIFOR, CIFOR-ICRAF, CIFOR
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Stefan Schmitz
Executive Director, Crop Trust
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Gilbert Houngbo
President, International Fund For Agricultural Development (IFAD)
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Bård Vegar Solhjell
Director General, Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation, Norad
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Jennifer Morgan
Executive Director, Greenpeace
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Galina Angarova
Executive Director, Cultural Survival
Indigenous peoples are the time-immemorial guardians of many of the world’s remaining biodiversity-rich landscapes – and of the spirituality, values and worldviews embedded in these physical spaces. As human encroachments threaten Indigenous ways of life and connection to land, the world urgently needs to find ways to support this guardianship to help ensure the health of the planet and diversity of species. This interactive plenary will amplify the voices of Indigenous guardians, and will provide a platform for civil society groups, the private sector, policy-makers, local authorities and youth to discuss and explore processes that draw from Indigenous peoples and local communities’ knowledge to generate scalable solutions to contemporary challenges. These solutions will be rooted in reciprocity, will help to achieve human and ecological well-being, and will promote just and sustainable decision-making that restores harmony between people and nature.
Find this session’s white paper here.
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Jennifer Tauli Corpuz
Global Policy and Advocacy Lead , Nia Tero
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Joji Carino
Senior Policy Advisor , Forest Peoples Programme
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Dominique Bikaba
Founder and Executive Director , Strong Roots Congo
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David Hernández Palmar
Filmmaker, independent curator and film programmer from the IIPUANA Clan, Venezuela
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Gerardo Macuna Miraña
Leader, Yaigoje Apaporis Indigenous Territory
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Mandy Bayha
Sahtúgot’ine mother
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Myrna Cunningham
Ex Board member, Association for Women’s Rights in Development (AWID)
Two days of dialogue and debate will compel participants to get ready for a strong call to global action. But what action is most urgently needed? So many of us are pleading for transformative change – but what does this require? Experts will discuss the need for a fundamental, system-wide change across technological, economic and social factors, including changing paradigms, goals and values. To achieve this, we must move away from looking at biodiversity as a production factor to seeing it as an integral part of life, without which we cannot survive. Moving from an economy of exploitation to an economy of restoration will require individual and collective behavioural change.
The Closing Plenary will be opened by Elizabeth Mrema, Executive Secretary of the CBD and will start with a conversation between Christiane Paulus, Director General at BMU, Carla Montesi, Director at DEVCO and Carlos Rodriguez, CEO of GEF, before moving to a dynamic panel of representatives from youth, government, business, civil society and indigenous people.
Participants will join the discussion and contribute to the transformative change which we will initiate here.
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Christiane Paulus
Director General, Nature Conservation and Sustainable Use of Natural Resources, German Ministry for Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety (BMUV)
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Elizabeth Mrema
Assistant Secretary-General and Deputy Executive Director, UN Environment Programme (UNEP)
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Carla Montesi
Director , European Commission’s Directorate General for Development and Cooperation
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Carlos Manuel Rodriguez
CEO and Chairperson, Global Environment Facility
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Melina Sakiyama
Co-Founder, Global Youth Biodiversity Network (GYBN)
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Yvonne Aki Sawyerr
Mayor of Freetown , Sierra Leone
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Mwambu Wanendeya
CEO and Founder, Carico
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Peter Daszak
President, EcoHealth Alliance
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Benki Piyãko
Asháninka Community Leader, Terra Kampa do Rio Amônia
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Robert Nasi
Chief Operating Officer, CIFOR-ICRAF Director General, CIFOR, CIFOR-ICRAF, CIFOR
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Rodrigo A. Medellin
Senior Professor, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
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Khairani Barokka
Writer, poet and artist, NYU Tisch Departmental Fellow
28 October 2020
The 252nd edition of international forestry journal Unasylva, “Restoring the Earth: the next decade”, is devoted to building momentum for the restoration agenda to 2030, particularly in light of the opportunities presented by major restoration commitments such as the Bonn Challenge, the New York Declaration on Forests, AFR100, Initiative 20×20 and the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration 2021-2030.
Join leaders of the Asian Forest Cooperation Organization (AFoCO), World Agroforestry and Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR-ICRAF), Global EverGreening Alliance (Alliance) for the signing of a landmark partnership agreement to restore drylands and drought-prone areas in Asia.
Global Biodiversity Outlook (GBO) is the flagship publication of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). GBO-5 provides global summary of progress towards the Aichi Biodiversity Targets and sets the scene for the development of the post 2020-global biodiversity framework. It is based on a range of indicators, research studies and assessments (in particular the IPBES Global Assessment on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services), as well as the national reports provided by countries on their implementation of the CBD. This Outlook draws on the lessons learned during the first two decades of this century to identify the transitions needed if we are to realize the vision agreed by world governments for 2050, ‘Living in Harmony with Nature’.
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David Cooper
Deputy Executive Secretary, United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) , Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD)
29 October 2020
Learn with forestry experts in Malawi, swim with Indigenous leaders in reef systems off the coast of Mexico and restore the Earth with young people in every landscape.
More than ever, we are realizing how interconnected we are. Public health, biodiversity, and ecosystem restoration are interconnected. Biodiversity underpins life on Earth; it protects our health and wellbeing and it is up to us to restore it.
Agriculture is the main income source for most rural households in Asia and the Pacific region. However, the increasing biodiversity loss due to climate change represents a huge threat to people’s livelihoods, the consequences of which could be even more dangerous than the COVID-19 pandemic. To promote youth engagement in biodiversity protection toward achieving the UN 2030 Sustainable Development Goals, this Youth Daily Show – led by Young Professionals for Agricultural Development (YPARD) in collaboration with the Youth in Landscapes Initiative (YIL) – will explore what young Indigenous people working in agriculture are doing to preserve biodiversity
Years from now, historians will be discussing the reality we are living and the tomorrow we are defining. What will they call this age? The age of climate denial, the age of biodiversity loss or could it possible be the age of collective action? In a critical moment for the planet and all its peoples, the IPBES 2019 Global Assessment Report on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services, suggest that we all get on the train of Transformative Change – a profound, fundamental, system-wide and strategic change in discourses, actions, values and policy.
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Swetha Stotra Bhashyam
The Global South Focal Point, The Global Youth Biodiversity Network (GYBN)
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Simangele Msweli
The Steering Committee, The Global Youth Biodiversity Network
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Josefa Cariño Taulí
The Steering Committee, The Global Youth Biodiversity Network (GYBN
As we proceed through the 21st century and confront today’s biodiversity crisis, we on one hand realize how intertwined our well-being is with our biodiversity and ecosystem health, and on the other hand, we find ourselves immersed in a globalized urban cultural dimension detached from our roots.
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Tisha Ramadhin
Community Relations , Fairventures Worldwide FVW Indonesia
The Amazon, the Earth’s largest and most diverse rainforest, biodiversity hotspot and home to many indigenous communities, is on fire. The majority of these fires are not wildfires – they are ignited and can often be traced back to illegal forest clearing to create land for monocultures and support the increasing demand for commodities such as soy, coffee, cocoa and palm oil. Fires are just one of the impacts that monocultures have on the Amazons. During this Youth Daily Show, the Youth in Landscapes Initiative discusses with young experts from the Latin America Region the impacts of monocultures on the health of the local ecosystem and its biodiversity, as well as the health and food security of local communities.
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Heitor Mancini Teixeira
Researcher, Wageningen University & Research
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Débora Lima
Post doctorate researcher , University of São Paulo, Brazil
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Carla Madueno
Ecologist , YIL Alumni Representative
Facilitated networking sessions will connect you with people across the globe. Meet a new person every five minutes! The networking moderator will provide you with the information you can use to develop your questions, in order to make the most of your networking time.
Weekly interactive meetings
As part of the program, four weekly interactive sessions will take place prior to the digital conference, each at around 14:00 CEST.
During the sessions, participants will have the chance to share knowledge, expertise, and ideas. Through digital collaboration with peers; networking sessions; inspiring talks; and skills-based training sessions, participants will go on a journey of discovery about biocultural diversity in landscapes, climate action, biodiversity and finance, and nature-based solutions.
Participants who join at least three of the four interactive sessions will receive a free certificate of course completion, and free access to the GLF Biodiversity Digital Conference.
AGENDA
14:00
14:00
Biological and cultural diversity are key features of all of our landscapes. Biodiversity contributes to our lives not only in practical, physical and functional ways, but also in cultural and spiritual ones. In this interactive meeting, we will explore some of the diversity in perspectives on, and relationships with, nature. We will consider the interlinkages between biological and cultural diversity within a professional context, and will also explore personal understandings and experiences of living in harmony with nature.
14:00
The second meeting is led by the Wageningen Centre for Development and Innovation (WCDI), as an introduction to the Massive Open Online Course (MOOC). The session will focus on climate change, climate action and biodiverse landscapes, and it will address the impact that climate change has on biodiversity, as well as the important role that biodiversity can play in tackling the climate crises.
14:00
What does the world of money, investments and profit have to do with the world of bees, dolphins and mangroves? During the third meeting, we will consolidate and develop our learnings from the climate and finance MOOC module, by building a deeper understanding of the relationship between biodiversity and finance, and focusing specifically on the design of Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES) schemes as an important skill for any land-use practitioner.
14:00
The world is looking for holistic and efficient ways to address multiple global challenges such as biodiversity loss, the climate crisis, food and water sovereignty, as well as preventing future global pandemics. During this meeting, led by Youth 4 Nature in collaboration with YIL and GLF, we will explore how and to what extent nature-based solutions (NBS) can be utilized for the benefit of our societies and the world’s biodiversity..
Volunteer
Develop yourself both personally and professionally: volunteer! In a world full of ego, values such as compassion, empathy, and the simple desire to dedicate hours for a common good are often left aside.
When you volunteer with GLF, you’ll work with fellow leaders to promote a message that’s essential for our time – and for the next generation. We’ll be counting on you and your skills to make sure it all shakes out in the best way possible.
YOUTH DELEGATIONS AND POLICY BRIEF
On the road to the post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework, and in line with the United Nations General Assembly declaration for the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration (2021–2030), the Youth in Landscapes Initiative has invited youth organizations from all around the world to contribute to the Global Landscapes Forum Biodiversity Policy Brief. Through an intra- and inter-generational lens, this policy brief aims to bring into the global biodiversity agenda recommendations and action points for addressing the biodiversity crisis, based on knowledge co-created and shared during the GLF Biodiversity Digital Conference.
BIODIVERSITY: A DIGITAL JOURNEY
80 participants from 37 countries embarked on a digital journey four weeks before the GLF Biodiversity Digital Conference, following the new Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) “Climate action in biodiverse landscapes”, and attending weekly interactive learning sessions on a range of topics. Through digital collaboration with peers, networking sessions, inspiring talks and skills-based training sessions, participants went on a journey of discovery about biocultural diversity in landscapes, climate action, biodiversity and finance, and nature-based solutions.
Do you want to learn more about these topics too? Read the outcome of each session!