Environment Ministers from Brazil and the United Kingdom kick off the process to develop a Brazilian biodiversity conservation and sustainable use pla

By Denise Oliveira, WWF-Brasil, 16 Abril 2011.

Brasilia, Brazil - During the event which took place on Friday, April 8, 2011, in Brasilia, at the Brazilian Ministry of Foreign Relations, the British Minister of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Caroline Spelman, announced a financial support from the United Kingdom to biodiversity conservation in Brazil.

The initiative entitled Dialogues on Biodiversity: building the Brazilian strategy for 2020 is meant to engage Brazilian society in a process to strengthen the implementation of the agreements reached at the 10th Conference of the Parts on Biological Diversity (CBD CoP-10) which took place in October 2010 in Nagoya, Japan. This will be achieved through the design of the Brazilian plan for the implementation of the defined targets. On Friday, April 8, the Brazilian and the British Environment Ministers gave the start to the first of a series of discussions on this theme.

The Brazilian Minister of the Environment, Izabella Teixeira, stressed that this is a moment of cooperation on biodiversity and of preparation of a solid path following the event in Nagoya. "Brazil has the Rio-92 legacy; nevertheless, we want to think ahead and go beyond those past 20 years. Brazil's objective is to have a strategic agenda for the conservation of its biodiversity and ecosystems, including the marine environment. Our country seeks to be consistent in its international commitments and the actions taken in the national scope", said IzabellaTeixeira.

Caroline Spelman, UK's minister for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, announced a financial support from her government to Brazil, totaling 90,000 British pounds to develop such a dialogue in Brazil plus 25 million pounds for biodiversity conservation, during the next five years. Spelman said that she was impressed with the various sectors involved in protecting the environment. "Establishing partnerships between governments is crucial to achieve biodiversity conservation", she pointed out.

WWF-Brazil's Conservation Director, Claudio Maretti, states that the Brazilian initiative is crucial to place the country in a position of global leadership. "Brazil has the courage to take the lead and show the world that the targets which were defined in Nagoya must be addressed in a serious and committed way. It is time to demonstrate that it is possible to implement those targets and we are paving the way", he said.

Everyone's commitment

The Brazilian Ministry of the Environment, the International Union for Conservation of Nature - IUCN, WWF-Brazil and IPÊ (Institute for Ecological Research) are in the lead of this process, which also involves a large group of representatives from the academic and corporate sectors, the civil society and the government.

The purpose of this initiative is to carry out a series of seminars and to come out with a proposal of a federal law, which will state the targets and objectives of the Strategic Plan for the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), as well as an action plan for the implementation of the national targets.

"The world decided, in Nagoya, that everyone must make efforts to reach zero deforestation by 2020. This process seeks to achieve a national law to state this target and how to achieve it. This is very important both for Brazil and for the planet. I believe that, in doing this, Brazil will encourage other countries to do the same", said WWF-Brazil's Conservation Director, Cláudio Maretti.

As one of the organizations in charge of this initiative, WWF-Brazil is working to mobilize partner business corporations - such as Walmart, Unilever and Natura - to participate in the process.