Has climate change hijacked the environmental agenda?

By

Cardoso Pereira, Cássio
Negreiros, Daniel
Barbosa, Milton
Goulart, Fernando F.
Dias, Rodrigo De Loyola
Melillo, Maria Clara
Camarota, Flávio
Pimenta, Mariana
Cruz, Marina
Fernandes, Geraldo Wilson Afonso

Type

Article

Date of Publication

2023

Original Publication

Nature conservation

Volume

53

Pages

157--164

Subjects

Biodiversity crisis , climate change , Conference of the Parties , COP Bio , COP Climate , environmental agenda , Global warming , integrated management

Contributed by

Pensoft Publishers

Language

English

Published by

Sofia, Bulgaria Pensoft Publishers 2012-

Identifiers

DOI: https://doi.org/10.3897/natureconservation.53.110961

 

Abstract

Since the establishment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), decision-makers have realised that periodic assessments were needed to closely monitor climate change. Studies on it became widespread and include the science of greenhouse gas emissions, the composition of these gases and the extent to which humans have been responsible for climate change. In this sense, the United Nations summit has made significant progress since the Rio Conference (Eco 92), with the creation of the Conference of the Parties (COPs). However, governments should not solely focus on curbing greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere. In a society with broad and deep environmental problems, governments, the private sector and non-governmental organisations’ (NGOs) efforts should include biodiversity conservation in their agenda. Solving a single problem, the climate crisis is honourable and urgently needed, but to constrain our ever-increasing land-use footprints on the planet needs the tackling of another equally challenging problem, the loss of biodiversity. The destruction of ecosystems undermines nature’s ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions and protect against extreme weather, thus accelerating climate change and increasing our vulnerability to it. Therefore, tackling environmental challenges means more than building electric cars, investing in “clean” energy and imposing fines on those who burn forests. To save the environment, scientists, industry, policy-makers and the wider society urgently need to look at other aspects of ecosystem conservation and restoration in the same way they look at the climate agenda.