Hyderabad, Oct 8 (IANS): The eleventh meeting of the United Nations' Conference of the Parties (COP 11) to the Convention of Biological Diversity (CBD) began here Monday with India calling on the participating nations to commit resources to achieve biodiversity targets by 2020.
India, which took over the presidency of the COP for the next two years, said the global economic crisis should not deter the countries from making investment in biodiversity.
Addressing the conference, being attended by over 10,000 delegates from 173 countries, India's Environment and Forest minister Jayanthi Natarajan said expenditure on biodiversity needed to be looked as an investment that will reap benefits "for us and for our future generations".
"Present global economic crisis should not deter us but on the contrary encourage us to invest more towards amelioration of natural capital for ensuring uninterrupted ecosystem services on which all life on earth depends," she said.
The two-week-long conference at Hyderabad International Convention Centre (HICC) here is discussing the progress made and challenges to implement the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011-2020, which was adopted at COP 10 in 2010 in Nagoya, Japan.
Signed by 150 government leaders at the 1992 Rio Earth Summit, the CBD is dedicated to promoting sustainable development.
Its strategic plan, a 10-year framework for action, including on the 20 biodiversity targets set at the COP 10 in Nagoya, Aichi Prefecture, Japan, in 2010 have been established as the overall framework for biodiversity work in the UN system.
The Aichi Biodiversity Targets include raising awareness among people on the values of biodiversity and the steps they can take to conserve and use it sustainably by 2020.
Pointing out that COP 10 could not agree on targets for funding as a means to achieve Aichi biodiversity targets, Natarajan said: "This is the time of reckoning for us when we have been provided with opportunity to collectively decide on committing resources so as to infuse confidence among parties and generate momentum for implementation of Aichi targets. If we miss this one chance it will be our collective failure, making it impossible to achieve Aichi targets by 2020."
"We acknowledge that assessment of biodiversity financing is an ongoing process but some interim commitments and targets on resource mobilization must be agreed to here failing which attainment of Aichi targets will be severely impacted considering their time-bound nature."
The minister said the challenges for India and other developing countries was to strike a balance between addressing environmental concerns and the need to eradicate poverty but for the developed world the challenge is how to change consumption pattern.
CBD Executive Secretary Braulio Ferreira de Souza Diaz said expenditures on biodiversity should not be seen as costs. "They should be seen as investments that will pay back with significant environmental, social and economic benefits for all our societies."
"Yes, we are facing times of financial crisis, but times of crisis are the best opportunities to make substantive changes in the way we do business," he added calling upon every party and partner to the CBD to select one or more of the Aichi Targets and to become a regional or a global champion for its achievement.
Amina Mohamed, UN Assistant Secretary-General and Deputy Executive Director of UNEP, asked parties to step up effort for the early ratification of the Nagoya Protocol on Access and Benefit Sharing.
She noted that the meet came at an opportune and historic moment when the international community just renewed its commitments for sustainable development at the Rio+20 Summit.
"Only time will tell if Rio+20 proves to be a game-changer in humanity's relationship with the natural world and those essential, multi-trillion dollar services that maintain and support us all," she added.