TARGET 20 - Technical Rationale extended (provided in document COP/10/INF/12/Rev.1)

Technical rationale: Most countries indicate in their fourth national reports that limited capacity, both financial and human, is a major obstacle to the implementation of one or more of the three goals of the Convention. National investment to strengthen capacity is poorly documented globally. However, in at least some biodiversity-rich countries, such as Mexico, that are documented, investment is increasing, and diversifying.⁵⁶ Estimates for total current financing of biodiversity is of the order of US$36-38 billion annually with around US$ 20-22 billion being spend in developed countries and around US$ 15-16 billion being spend in developing countries. Of this, some US$ 24 billion is from domestic government spending (around US$ 16 billion in developed countries and around US$ 8 billion in developing countries). Market-based spending on biodiversity is currently rather limited. International financing for biodiversity conservation has been increasing and has been estimated to have grown by approximately 38 per cent in real terms since 1992.⁵⁷ Despite this increase, the capacity for implementing the Convention, in terms of trained staff and financial resources, is limited in most countries, especially in developing countries, and in particular the least developed countries and small island developing states. Currently, it is estimated that international financing for biodiversity, as reported to the OECD, is approximately US$ 3.1 billion per year.⁵⁸

A number of studies have attempted to estimate the funding needs for biodiversity. Some of the most well document estimates have focused on the costs associated with protected area networks both at a regional and global scale. Estimates focussing on protected areas generally fall in the range of $20 billion to $50 billion a year.⁵⁹,⁶⁰ It is estimated that spending on tropical terrestrial protected areas needs to increase from about $1 billion per year to about $13 billion per year⁶¹, while an additional $6-20billion a year is needed for marine protected areas.⁶²,⁶³ Estimates that also include maintenance of biodiversity outside protected areas or for total ecosystem protection in the context of climate change mostly fall in the range of US$ 300–400 billion per year.⁶⁴,⁶⁵,⁶⁶

The capacity which currently exists in countries needs to be safeguarded and increased from current levels, in line with the process laid out in the Strategy for Resource Mobilization, in order to enable countries to meet the challenges of implementing the Convention’s revised Strategic Plan. The fulfilment of this target will also have implications on the feasibility of achieving the other 19 targets contained in the revised Strategic Plan. While a full and precise costing of the actions needed to implement the revised Strategic Plan is not available, a rough comparison of estimates of current financing with the estimates on financing needs provided above reveals that, while existing financing is in the order of a tens of billions of dollars a year (including international aid flows in the order of a few billion dollars a year), total needs are of the order of a few hundreds of billions of dollars a year (including a tens of billions for protected areas a year). A recent review concludes “Scaling up successful approaches requires much greater investment in biodiversity conservation, by at least an order of magnitude”.⁶⁷ A proportionately greater increase is required in developing countries as compared to developed countries. This might be achieved through a combination of aid flows, domestic spending, and market mechanisms.⁶⁸ Meeting the MDG-related commitment for aid flows to reach 0.7 per cent GNI implies a doubling of aid and would also imply a doubling (or greater) of biodiversity-related aid, if the current percentage of aid that is biodiversity-related remains constant. Substantial increases in market-related mechanisms may be realized given the additional resources which are expected to become available through mechanisms such as “REDD-plus”, and schemed related to ecosystem-based adaptation to climate change, and payment for ecosystem services.

Implementation: This target should be seen as a common commitment by donors and recipient countries to take action, as appropriate, to both increase development cooperation funds available for biodiversity relevant activities, consistent with the Paris Declaration, and also to give appropriate priority in the use of those funds. It does not necessarily require the earmarking of funds by those donors which provide budget-wide support to developing countries. It assumes that developed countries will comply with their commitments under the Monterey Consensus. In accordance with the Convention, financing will be from both domestic and international sources, including innovative financing mechanisms, in line with the Convention’s Strategy for Resource Mobilization adopted at the ninth meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity. Financing that is envisaged to become available for reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation is expected to provide substantial biodiversity co-benefits. Financing envisaged for adaptation also has a potential to become available for biodiversity-friendly ecosystem-based adaptation. Funds already committed for these purposes, as part of the Copenhagen Accord, are at least an order of magnitude higher than funds currently committed for biodiversity.⁶⁹ The increase in capacity included as part of this target should be conducted bearing in mind the provisions of Article 20 of the Convention and on the resources needs assessment to be conducted and reported on by Parties during the eleventh meeting of the conference of the Parties in 2012.

Indicator and baseline information: Official development assistance (ODA) provided in support of the Convention is one indicator for this target. Additional indicators could include the resources provided to developing countries which are dispersed through mechanisms other than official development assistance. Another possible indicator includes the number of officials and experts qualified on biodiversity-related matters. Data related to official development assistance are already available and could serve as a baseline for gauging progress towards this goal.

⁵⁶PRPG Salcido, IA Quiroz, RR Ramírez, Biodiversity Conservation. 18, 1421 (2009), quoted in Rands et al (2010)
⁵⁷Gutman P, Davidson S, A Review of Innovative International Financial Mechanisms for Biodiversity Conservation with a Special Focus on the International Financing of Developing Countries’ Protected Areas (World Wide Fund for Nature, Gland, Switzerland, 2008), quoted in Rands et al (2010)
⁵⁸Butchart, SHM, Walpole, M, Collen, B, van Strien, A, Scharlemann, JPW, Almond, REA, Baillie, J. E. M., et al. (2010). Global Biodiversity: Indicators of Recent Declines. Science, 328(5982), 1164-1168.
⁵⁹Bruner, AG, Gullison RE & Balmford, A 2004. Financial needs for comprehensive, functional protected area systems in developing countries. BioScience 54: 1119-1126.
⁶⁰James A, Gaston K and Balmford A (2001) Can we afford to conserve biodiversity? Bioscience. 51, 43-52
⁶¹Brooks, TM, Wright, SJ and Sheil, D (2009), Evaluating the Success of Conservation Actions in Safeguarding Tropical Forest Biodiversity. Conservation Biology, 23: 1448–1457.
⁶²Bruner, A, Naidoo, R and Balmford, A (2008). Review of the economics of biodiversity loss: Scoping the science – Review of the costs and priorities for action. The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity.
⁶³Balmford, A, Gravestock, P, Hockley, N, McClean, CJ, & Roberts, CM (2004). The worldwide costs of marine protected areas. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 101(26), 9694-7.
⁶⁴James A, Gaston K and Balmford A (2001) Can we afford to conserve biodiversity? Bioscience. 51, 43-52
⁶⁵Berry. P (2007) Adaptation options on natural ecosystems. A report to the UNFCCC Secretariat. Environmental Change Unit, Oxford. UK.
⁶⁶IUCN (2007) Saving biodiversity – an economic approach. In Knee, A (editor).
⁶⁷Rands, M. R. W., Adams, W. M., Bennun, L., Butchart, S. H. M., Clements, A., Coomes, D., Entwistle, A., et al. (2010). Biodiversity Conservation: Challenges Beyond 2010. Science, 329(5997), 1298-1303.
⁶⁸Parker C & Cranford M (2010) The Little biodiversity finance book – a guide to proactive investment in natural capital. Global Canopy Programme, Oxford, UK.
⁶⁹The recent Copenhagen Accord refers to scaled up, new and additional funding to enable and support enhanced action on mitigation, including substantial finance to REDD-plus, adaptation, capacity-building, technology development and transfer. The commitment is to provide resources (via public and private, bilateral and multilateral, and alternative sources of finance) ranging from $10 billion a year in the short term (“Fast Track”) to $100 billion a year by 2020 to address the needs of developing countries.
⁷⁰WGRI recommendation 3/8 paragraph 2.