Decision COP XIII/4
CBD/COP/DEC/XIII/4
Biodiversity and climate change
Noting resolution XII.11 of the Conference of the Contracting Parties to the Convention on Wetlands of International Importance especially as Waterfowl Habitat (the Ramsar Convention) at its twelfth session, entitled “Peatlands, climate change and wise use: Implications for the Ramsar Convention”, which highlights the role of peatlands in climate change not only in adaptation but also in mitigation,
2.Encourages Parties and other Governments, when developing their Nationally Determined Contributions and, where appropriate, implementing associated domestic measures, to fully take into account the importance of ensuring the integrity of all ecosystems, including oceans, and the protection of biodiversity, and to integrate ecosystem-based approaches, involving the national focal points to the Convention on Biological Diversity in this work and ensuring that information and tools and guidance developed under the Convention on Biological Diversity are used, as appropriate;
5.Emphasizes the importance of marine protected areas, inland waters protected areas, coastal resource management and marine spatial planning in protecting and building the resilience of marine and coastal ecosystems, communities and infrastructure against the impacts of climate change;
6.Takes note of policy approaches and positive incentives for activities relating to reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation, and the role of conservation, sustainable management of forests and enhancement of forest carbon stocks in developing countries, as well as alternative policy approaches, such as joint mitigation and adaptation approaches for the integral and sustainable management of forests, and the potential role of these approaches in the conservation of biological diversity and disaster risk reduction;
(a)To address the degradation of, loss of, and impacts on biodiversity and, where appropriate, related social, environmental and economic impacts associated with climate change and disasters, considering the costs of inaction, and the value of investing in actions in a timely manner in order to reduce biodiversity loss and other negative impacts;
(b)To take into consideration the status of biodiversity and its vulnerability to current and future climate change impacts when planning and implementing ecosystem-based approaches to climate change adaptation, mitigation and disaster risk reduction activities, and to minimize and, where possible, avoid activities that may increase the vulnerability and reduce the resilience of biodiversity and ecosystems;
(f)To recognize the role of protected areas and other effective area-based conservation measures as cost-effective instruments for climate change adaptation and mitigation as well as disaster risk reduction, and that increased investment for management and conservation will have positive economic, social and environmental effects;
(i)To systematically assemble and analyse evidence to assess the effectiveness of ecosystem-based approaches to climate change adaptation and mitigation, and disaster risk reduction, including through development of improved monitoring and evaluation methods, noting that such methods are best developed and applied early in the planning phase;
(l)To promote platforms, such as those established under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, for the exchange of experiences and sharing of best practices, including those of indigenous peoples and local communities on ecosystem-based approaches to climate change adaptation and mitigation, and disaster risk reduction, in a holistic and integrated manner;
9.Recalls paragraph 5 of decision IX/16, in which it encouraged Parties, other Governments, donors and relevant organizations to provide financial and technical support to capacity-building activities, including through raising public awareness, so as to enable developing countries, especially least developed countries, small island developing States and countries with economies in transition, to implement activities related to the impacts of climate change, and of the positive and negative impacts of climate change mitigation and adaptation activities on biodiversity;
10.Requests the Executive Secretary to prepare, subject to the availability of resources, in collaboration with relevant organizations, in particular the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction, voluntary guidelines for the design and effective implementation of ecosystem-based approaches to climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction, for consideration by the Subsidiary Body on Scientific Technical and Technological Advice prior to the fourteenth meeting of the Conference of the Parties;
11.Also requests the Executive Secretary to ensure that the voluntary guidelines consider existing guidance, including that developed under the Convention on Biological Diversity, the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, and include information on:
12.Further requests the Executive Secretary to further promote synergies with the Secretariat of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-20302 and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, ensuring that this includes increasing knowledge and sharing of information, guidance and tools developed under the Convention on Biological Diversity relating to the impacts of climate change on biological diversity and the role of ecosystems for climate change adaptation, mitigation and disaster risk reduction, with a view to identifying possible solutions;
13.Requests the Executive Secretary to further enhance synergies between the work of the Convention on ecosystem restoration, ecosystem-based approaches to climate change adaptation and mitigation and the work on land degradation neutrality and sustainable land management under the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification and ensure coherence with relevant approaches under other United Nations bodies.
- Body
- Conference of the Parties (COP)
- Meeting
- COP-134 - 17 December, 2016Cancun, Mexico
- Decision document
- Biodiversity and climate change
- Documents
- CBD/SBSTTA/22/INF/1
- Related decisions