CALI, Colombia (AP) — United Nation’s Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged countries on Tuesday to make new pledges to help save global biodiversity and called for the private sector to come on board. “Nature is life, and yet we are waging a war against it, a war where there can be no winner,” Guterres said in his opening remarks at the U.N.
biodiversity summit, known as COP16, in Cali, Colombia. “Every day, we lose more species. Every minute, we dump a garbage truck of plastic waste into our oceans, rivers and lakes,” he said.
“This is what an existential crisis looks like.” The two-week summit is a follow-up to the historic 2022 accord in Montreal, which to save Earth’s plant and animal life. Guterres’ comments came a day after talks gridlocked over how to fund conservation.
On Monday, eight governments pledged an additional $163 million to the Global Biodiversity Framework Fund, which environmental advocates say is far off the billions needed to save global biodiversity. So far a total of $400 million is in the fund that provides targeted support to countries and communities to conserve and restore plant and animal species and ecosystems. “We need a lot more committed, from many more nations,” said Kristian Teleki, CEO of the conservation charity Fauna & Flora.
The 2022 agreement signed by 196 countries calls for protecting 30% of land and water by 2030, known as 30 by 30. When the agreement was signed, 17% of terrestrial and 10% of marine areas.