Prof. Alice Catherine Hughes: Mainstreaming Conservation Policy and Practice

On September 21, 2024, Prof. Alice Catherine Hughes(Chinese name:胡丽诗), Deputy Secretary-General of the China Biodiversity Conservation and Green Development Foundation(CBCGDF) and Professor of the School of Biological Sciences of the University of Hong Kong, was invited to attend the Ecological Civilization and Sustainable Development Summit held at the Cheung On Tak Lecture Hall of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, and delivered a keynote speech themed "Mainstreaming Conservation Policy and Practice".

In her speech, Professor Alice Catherine Hughes discussed the current status and challenges of global ecological protection and proposed a series of solutions. She pointed out that humans are currently facing an ecological crisis, with 1 million animal and plant species facing the threat of extinction. Since the industrial age, 1%-2.5% of birds, mammals, amphibians, reptiles and fish have become extinct, and the per capita forest area has decreased by more than 60% in the past 60 years. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations estimates that 10 million hectares of forest are cut down each year. The sixth planetary boundary has been broken, but the completion of global biodiversity conservation goals is still out of reach.

Prof. Hughes stressed that sustainable development is not just a climate issue, but requires integrating ecological protection with climate goals. This includes integrating supply chains into protection goals, as the lack of climate and biodiversity reflection in policies often exacerbates the problem, such as the EU's biofuel initiative. In addition, she mentioned that so-called "nature-based climate solutions" often have low success rates and may bring negative results.

When discussing ecological protection, Prof. Hughes pointed out the importance of definitions and standards. She warned that loose definitions and lack of standards may lead to "greenwashing", that is, false propaganda under the guise of solutions. She also talked about the concept of ecological and protection red lines, emphasizing green development planning based on high-resolution data to balance service supply and demand. She advocated a holistic solution, pointing out that the goal cannot be achieved unless people integrate the supply chain into the solution. Zero deforestation supply chain is an important step in this. New developments need better environmental impact assessments, and ecological compensation and bond issues also need attention.

At the end of the report, she summarized sustainable development as a multifaceted problem that requires multifaceted solutions and approaches. Addressing climate change requires understanding commodity chains and consumption impacts. Any climate change "solution" that ignores ecology is likely to fail. Nature-based solutions (NbS) do offer opportunities, but require clear monitoring and standards. Achieving sustainability requires scaling up conservation measures across all sectors, which involves interaction and participation from all of society, from how we consume to how we develop, meaning sustainable finance, sustainable infrastructure and sustainable energy production. Furthermore, active participation of people not only drives results, but also generates information and data to help monitor progress towards biodiversity targets.

Original article:https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/7gQO1aNZ91t4Kh2YfbA49Q

Translator: Daisy

Checked by Sara

Editor: Daisy

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