COP 14 - Agriculture Day
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FAO jointly organized Agriculture Day at CBD COP 14, Sharm El Shiekh, Egypt -- Agriculture and Biodiversity: walking hand-in-hand toward a sustainable world, on Sunday 25 November 2018 together with CBD Secretariat and the Mexican Government, in partnership with GIZ, Rare, IUCN and Conservation International.
The long-term sustainability of agriculture and food systems depends on the ecological functions and services provided by biodiversity, most importantly food security and nutrition. Tackling food security and nutrition, poverty eradication and biodiversity conservation int he face of climate change and other threats requires a better understanding and coherent actions, across agricultural sectors, to mutually support the global objectives.
Farmers, fishers and forest users need more than a set of technical solutions, however. They need an integral vision that supports them with adequate incentives to conserve or restore degraded habitats, improve production in a sustainable and efficient way, and obtain better returns for their products. Higher productivity, within sustainability limits means more land for conservation and less pressure on remaining natural resources.
The Agriculture Day aimed to bring the perspective of multiple stakeholders to illustrate why, how and who are championing solutions to protect biodiversity, while increasing productivity and improving livelihoods.The day was the second best attended Rio Conventions Pavilion event, with 135 participants, illustrating the interests of CBD Parties in FAO's work. Institutions attending included: UNCBD, UNDP, IPES-Food, GIZ, WWF, Bioversity International, IISD, IIED, ICRAF, INIA-Peru, IUCN, SAGARPA-Mexico, BFN-Germany, Forest Peoples Program, PEW Charitable Trust, ICARDA, IDDRI, MMA-Brazil, and the Egyptian Environmental Ministry, among others.
Two key panels discussed the need, use and impact of incentives to support these solutions:
Five key messages from the day:
- Agriculture is clearly a crucial sector for the post 2020 Framework to achieve sustainable use and conservation of biodiversity
- It is important that achieving sustainable agriculture not only uses biodiversity sustainably, but also restores it
- Sustainable agriculture cannot be achieved without a broad coalition of actors
- There is, therefore, a need for an integrated systems approach: from farm to landscapes
- Three CBD cross-cutting initiatives within the Programme of Work on Agriculture and Biodiversity are very relevant to address these issues, but agroecology approaches, private sector engagement and value chain development are all critical for their implementation.
These messages were supported with the launch of the publication: Mainstreaming biodiversity in production landscapes at the closing of Agriculture Day. The publication highlights the importance of integrated partnerships to address the huge challenges for biodiversity mainstreaming. This supports the IES approach of improved coordination across sectors to work towards restoration and conservation of biodiversity and production landscapes, sustainable production practices from farm to landscapes, and development of value chains to support improved livelihoods.