Chinese conservationists call for ‘human-based’ approach to protecting biodiversity
- The schemes promoted ahead of the UN COP15 conference in Kunming include measures to involve whole communities
- Last year a UN report found that the international community had failed to meet any of the targets for preserving species and habitats agreed a decade earlier
The China Biodiversity Conservation and Green Development Foundation, a Beijing-based non-profit organisation, said “human-based” schemes could help to protect species and habitats in areas of extensive human activity.
“The situation of aggravated biodiversity loss may change only if everyone participates in biodiversity conservation around them,” Zhou Jinfeng, secretary general of the foundation, said.
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One concept Zhou’s group has proposed is the Biodiversity Conservation in Our Neighbourhood (BCON) scheme, which aims to coordinate sustainable development and conservation and “will most likely become a major strategy to curb the global rate of biodiversity loss”.
“Since the Convention on Biological Diversity was signed in 1992, we have not made any effective changes in reversing biodiversity loss,” Zhou said.
Examples he cited include schemes to promote ecological farming and reduce the use of pesticides, as well as eco-friendly cultivation techniques in lotus ponds.