Info, news & views for anyone interested in biodiversity conservation and good environmental decision making
“There are three times as many threatened species on the edges of our suburbs compared to rural areas, so they are disproportionately important areas. There’s less than 1 per cent of the Victorian Volcanic Plains grasslands left, Sydney’s biodiverse Cumberland Plains Woodland is disappearing and in Greater Brisbane, 98 per cent of vegetation is threatened and expansion there just continues unabated.”
Sarah Bekessy [see item 5]
In this issue of Dbytes
1. Finalising the post-2020 global biodiversity framework at COP15: a quick guide
2. Towards conservation and recovery of Victoria’s biodiversity – a report for changemakers
3. The fifth and final transformation: Restoring trust in decision-making
4. Mapping the planet’s critical natural assets
5. Will Australia’s cities continue to expand indefinitely?
6. Last week, a NSW court jailed me for 15 months for a peaceful climate protest. Hear my story
7. It’s natural to want to feed wildlife after disasters. But it may not help
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1. Finalising the post-2020 global biodiversity framework at COP15: a quick guide
This excellent briefing, prepared by the Parliamentary Library, is what is offered to the pollies as a backgrounder on this process.
“At Part Two of the 15th meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP15) to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), to be held in Montreal, Canada, from 7 to 19 December 2022, Parties will seek to finalise the 10-year post-2020 global biodiversity framework (GBF).”
8907660.pdf (aph.gov.au)
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2. Towards conservation and recovery of Victoria’s biodiversity – a report for changemakers
This report and position paper from the Royal Society of Victoria (RSV) is released in the context of a new post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework being negotiated under the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity. The framework will define targets and pathways for the conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity for the next decade and beyond. Since early 2019, consultation workshops and meetings involving all stakeholders have been organised at the national, regional, and global levels before its planned adoption at the resumed session of the 15th meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP 15), scheduled for 7–19 December 2022 in Montreal, Canada.
Towards Conservation & Recovery of Victoria’s Biodiversity – Report for Changemakers – The Royal Society of Victoria (rsv.org.au)
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3. The fifth and final transformation: Restoring trust in decision-making
One of the main findings of the Samuel Review of the EPBC Act was that it was not trusted, either by business nor by the wider community. Restoring trust requires a fundamental shift from process-based decision-making to outcome-based decisions. This requires standards supported by regional plans and stronger institutions, including information systems and compliance regimes. At the end of the day, people will only trust environmental laws that truly protect and conserve the environment.
https://sustainabilitybites.home.blog/2022/12/05/the-fifth-and-final-transformation-restoring-trust-in-decision-making/
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4. Mapping the planet’s critical natural assets
Sustaining the organisms, ecosystems and processes that underpin human wellbeing is necessary to achieve sustainable development. Here we define critical natural assets as the natural and semi-natural ecosystems that provide 90% of the total current magnitude of 14 types of nature’s contributions to people (NCP), and we map the global locations of these critical natural assets at 2 km resolution. Critical natural assets for maintaining local-scale NCP (12 of the 14 NCP) account for 30% of total global land area and 24% of national territorial waters, while 44% of land area is required to also maintain two global-scale NCP (carbon storage and moisture recycling). These areas overlap substantially with cultural diversity (areas containing 96% of global languages) and biodiversity (covering area requirements for 73% of birds and 66% of mammals). At least 87% of the world’s population live in the areas benefitting from critical natural assets for local-scale NCP, while only 16% live on the lands containing these assets. Many of the NCP mapped here are left out of international agreements focused on conserving species or mitigating climate change, yet this analysis shows that explicitly prioritizing critical natural assets and the NCP they provide could simultaneously advance development, climate and conservation goals.
Mapping the planet’s critical natural assets | Nature Ecology & Evolution
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5. Will Australia’s cities continue to expand indefinitely?
As Australia’s cities continue to grow outwards, the frictions between urban expansion and the encroachment upon native bushland and the environment have perhaps never been so precariously.
https://www.apimagazine.com.au/news/article/will-australias-cities-continue-to-expand-indefinitely
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6. Last week, a NSW court jailed me for 15 months for a peaceful climate protest. Hear my story
Violet Coco: “If you are reading this, then I have been sentenced to prison for peaceful environmental protest. I do not want to break the law. But when regular political procedure has proven incapable of enacting justice, it falls to ordinary people taking a stand to bring about change.”
Last week, a NSW court jailed me for 15 months for a peaceful climate protest. Hear my story – Pearls and Irritations (johnmenadue.com)
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7. It’s natural to want to feed wildlife after disasters. But it may not help
Think of the photos of thirsty koalas during the Black Summer fires, or the flood-hit mud-covered kangaroo. These images bring the hurt home to us in a way words can’t. It’s no surprise many of us have felt compelled to try and help these animals, offering food, water and shelter to try to help them survive. We celebrate when a flood-affected koala is returned to the wild. But it’s worth taking a look at whether our instinctive responses actually do what we hope. Unfortunately, there’s little scientific evidence these efforts help on a broad scale. It may help the animal in front of you – but the evidence is mixed on a species or ecosystem front. Sometimes, it can cause worse outcomes.
It’s natural to want to feed wildlife after disasters. But it may not help (theconversation.com)
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About Dbytes
Dbytes is a weekly eNewsletter presenting news and views on biodiversity conservation and environmental decision science. ‘D’ stands for ‘Decision’ and refers to all the ingredients that go into good, fair and just decision-making in relation to the environment.
From 2007-2018 Dbytes was supported by a variety of research networks and primarily the Centre of Excellence for Environmental Decisions (CEED). From 2019 Dbytes is being produced by David Salt (Ywords). Dbytes is supported by the Global Water Forum.
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