AFP UK

A scientist heaves a dead dolphin through Ukraine's Limans Tuzly Lagoons National Nature Park on August 28, 2022

The Ukraine conflict cast a shadow over a high-stakes UN summit on biodiversity in Montreal on Wednesday, as Western nations slammed the environmental destruction brought about by Russia’s invasion.

The broadsides by the European Union and New Zealand — which spoke on behalf of other countries, including the United States — came after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky accused Moscow of “ecocide” and of devastating his country’s dolphin population.

Russia fired back that the meeting was an inappropriate forum and accused its critics of attempting to sabotage a new global deal for nature.

“The war brings about pollution and long-term environmental degradation, destroying protected areas and natural habitats,” Hugo Schally, an EU representative at the meeting, known as COP15, said.

“While the war rages on, it blocks much needed action on nature conservation and restoration,” he added.

New Zealand’s Rosemary Paterson, speaking for the JUSCANZ group that includes Japan, Australia and the United States, added: “The widespread environmental destruction and transboundary harm caused by Russia’s military aggression against Ukraine cannot go unnoticed in this forum.”

Invoking a right-of-reply, Russian delegate Denis Rebrikov said: “We resolutely refute allegations against us as being outside the scope of this COP on biodiversity.”

He added that conflicts of the recent past — such as those in Iraq, Libya, Afghanistan and Syria — were not brought up at environmental summits, despite the harms done to ecosystems.

“It’s hard to avoid the impression that these countries are deliberately trying to sabotage the adoption of a global framework” on biodiversity, added Rebrikov.

Earlier in the day, President Zelensky of Ukraine said tens of thousands of dead dolphins had washed up on the Black Sea and accused Russia of “ecocide.” Ukrainian scientists have blamed military sonar used by Russian warships for the disaster.

Delegates from across the world have gathered from December 7 to 19 in Canada to try to hammer out a new deal for nature: a 10-year framework aimed at saving the planet’s forests, oceans and species before it’s too late. 

Draft targets include a cornerstone pledge to protect 30 percent of the world’s land and seas by 2030, eliminating harmful fishing and agriculture subsidies and tackling invasive species and reducing pesticides.

They found the DNA fragments frozen in a remote part of Greenland

Scientists in Greenland announced Wednesday they had found DNA dating back two million years — the oldest ever extracted — in sediment from the Ice Age, opening a new chapter in paleogenetics.

“We are breaking the barrier of what we thought we could reach in terms of genetic studies,” said Mikkel Winther Pedersen, co-author of a new study published in science journal Nature.

“It was long thought that one million years was the boundary of DNA survival, but now we are twice as old” as that, told AFP.

They found the DNA fragments in sediment from the northernmost part of Greenland known as Kap Copenhagen, said the University of Copenhagen lecturer.

The fragments “come from an environment that we do not see anywhere on Earth today,” he added. Frozen in a remote unpopulated area, the DNA had been very well preserved.

New technology enabled the scientists to determine that the 41 fragments were more than a million years older than the oldest known DNA, from a Siberian mammoth.

They had to first determine whether there was DNA hidden in the clay and quartz, then see whether it could be removed from the sediment to examine it.

The method used “provides a fundamental understanding of why minerals, or sediments, can preserve DNA”, said Karina Sand, who heads the geobiology team at the University of Copenhagen and who took part in the study.

“It’s a Pandora’s box we’re just about to open up”, she added.

– Species adaptability –

The “rivers running through the environment transported minerals and organic material into the marine environment and this was where these terrestrial sediments were deposited”, said Winther Pedersen.

Then, at some point around two million years ago, “this land mass beneath the water was raised up and became a part of North Greenland”, he explained.

Today, Kap Copenhagen is an Arctic desert, where different types of deposits, including plant and insect fossils preserved in excellent condition, have already been discovered.

But scientists hadn’t tried to establish the fossils’ DNA, and very little was known about the presence of animals at the time.

The research team, which began its work in 2006, has now made it possible to paint a picture of what the region looked like two million years ago.

“We had this forested environment with mastodons and reindeer and hares running around in the landscape together with a lot of different plant species”, he said, they had found 102 different kinds of plant.

The presence of mastodons was particularly noteworthy, he added, never having been found so far north before. The discovery has also given researchers more information about the adaptability of species.

Two million years ago, Greenland had temperatures 11 to 17 degrees warmer than today, but at its latitude, the sun doesn’t set in summer nor rise in winter.

“We don’t see this environment anywhere, this mix of species anywhere on Earth today”, said Winther Pedersen.

“The plasticity in species, how species are actually able to adapt to different types of climate, might be different than what we previously thought.

“And obviously, it makes us look for newer and older sites.

“There are several different sites across the world that actually have geological deposits that go this far back. And even further back,” ha added.

A southern right whale (Eubalaena australis) is photographed at La Cantera beach near Puerto Madryn, Chubut Province, Argentina

High-stakes UN biodiversity talks opened in Montreal Wednesday, in what is being billed as the “last best chance” to save the planet’s species and ecosystems from irreversible human destruction.

Delegates from across the world gathered for the December 7-19 meeting to try to hammer out a new deal for nature: a 10-year framework aimed at saving the planet’s forests, oceans and species before it’s too late. 

“This meeting is our chance to move from disharmony to harmony — to stop this orgy of destruction, and to conclude a peace pact with nature,” said Huang Runqiu, minister of ecology and environment of China, which is chairing the talks. 

The head of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) urged negotiators to land a strong framework for nature.

“We have now been negotiating for a long, long time. Everyone speaks of compromise, but we are not moving fast enough,” Inger Andersen said at the opening. 

“Nature and biodiversity are dying the death of a billion cuts and humanity is paying the price for betraying our closest friend.”

The official opening of the COP15 meeting follows several days of pre-negotiations that saw little progress on key issues, sparking fears parties may walk away without a good deal. 

Observers called for negotiators to urgently unblock sticking points on difficult items like finance and implementation, with only five out of more than 20 targets agreed so far. 

The summit “is probably the last best chance for governments to turn things around for nature, and to rescue our precious life support system,” Bernadette Fischler Hooper, head of international Advocacy at WWF, told reporters Tuesday.

– ‘Significant resistance’ –

Draft targets for the 10-year framework include a cornerstone pledge to protect 30 percent of the world’s land and seas by 2030, eliminating harmful fishing and agriculture subsidies and tackling invasive species and reducing pesticides.

Finance is among the most divisive issues, as developing nations are demanding increased funding for conservation.

Earlier this year, a coalition of nations called for wealthy countries to provide at least $100 billion annually –- rising to $700 billion a year by 2030 — for biodiversity. 

Some countries want to set up a separate funding mechanism for biodiversity, which wealthy nations have largely resisted.

The sticky issue of biopiracy is also causing roadblocks, as many mainly African countries demand that wealthy nations share the benefits of ingredients and formulas used in cosmetics and medicines derived from the Global South.

Implementation has emerged as another sticking point in recent days, with disagreements over how to ensure any final deal is put into practice — unlike its predecessor agreed in 2010. 

“There is significant resistance to having the robust monitoring and review mechanisms that we feel is necessary,” said a European source close to negotiations. 

– ‘Flexibility, compromise, consensus’ – 

The meeting, delayed two years because of the Covid-19 pandemic, follows crucial climate change talks in Egypt last month that ended with little headway on reducing emissions and scaling down the use of planet-warming fossil fuels. 

China is chair, though it is being hosted in Canada because of Beijing’s long-standing zero-Covid policy. 

But China’s President Xi Jinping will be a no-show — along with all other world leaders apart from Canada’s Trudeau — opting to visit oil-rich Saudi Arabia this week instead.

NGOs say the lack of world leaders at COP15 risks dampening momentum at the talks and could scupper an ambitious settlement. 

The talks come amid dire warning from scientists that the world is facing its biggest mass extinction event since the dinosaur age, with more than one million species at risk. 

Human activity has decimated forests, wetlands, waterways and the millions of plants, animals and insects that live in them, with half of global GDP in some way dependent on nature. 

With so much on the line, observers are calling for a “Paris moment” for nature — an ambitious deal in line with the landmark climate accord. 

Jacques Candelon among his mostly female ducks — a first for him this year — in Sarrant, southwest France

Foie gras pate, the consummate delicacy of French holiday tables, might be harder to find this year and certainly pricier due to a bird flu outbreak that ravaged farms across the west and south last winter.

After millions of ducks and geese were culled to halt the epidemic, some farmers say they are having to take an unprecedented step — using females to produce the luxury treat.

The taste is the same, but female livers are much smaller and harder to work with, and the impact on a producer’s bottom line is inescapable.

“It was double or nothing, but either we just sat and waited — which is not in our nature — or we try to offer a product that respects our consumers,” said Benjamin Constant in Samatan, southwest France.

President of the foie gras marketing board for the Gers department, Constant warned that it was only a stop-gap measure, especially for higher-quality fresh foie gras.

Most livers have veins that must be removed, but those of female livers are much bigger and require more effort to extract, which puts off clients seeking the smooth texture of fresh foie gras that is either seared in a pan, or used to make pate.

“A significant amount cannot be sold fresh, which penalises the producers who sell at public markets,” Constant said.

Jacques Candelon, who has been raising ducks in the rolling plains of nearby Sarrant since 1998, said this is the first year the majority of his 26,000 birds are females, which are usually reserved to produce meat for export.

“80 percent are females — it was either that or nothing,” the 52-year-old told AFP at his farm, dressed head to toe in protective gear to prevent any contamination of his animals.

– Bigger stretch –

Animal rights activists have long denounced the force-feeding of ducks and geese to make foie gras, calling it an unnecessary cruelty despite producers’ claims of introducing measures to make the process more humane.

France remains the world’s largest producer and consumer, usually raising some 30 million ducks alone each year, even though some French cities have banned it from official functions.

But two brutal bird flu outbreaks in recent years decimated flocks as authorities imposed culls, with just 21 million ducks raised in 2021, a number expected to plunge to 15 million for 2022, according to the CIFOG producers’ association.

More problematic was the impact on breeding farms, which found themselves with only scant numbers of male chicks to offer producers this year.

Labeyrie, the brand that dominates sales among mass retailers, expects a shortage of 30 to 40 percent this holiday season, by far the most important time of the year for the sector. 

Spiralling energy and feed prices, fallout from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, will also make foie gras more of a stretch for family budgets.

“There will be enough for the holidays but in limited quantities,” CIFOG director Marie-Pierre Pe told AFP in September. “We’re hoping that people are going to be reasonable and will share what little there is.”

– ‘Big effort’ –

Old habits die hard, however, and at the bustling weekly duck market at Samatan, a foie gras bastion near Toulouse in the heart of Gers, much of the crowd wanted only the pale, plump male livers.

“Females are much, much smaller and after force-feeding, the livers are smaller and less attractive visually,” said Didier Villate, a veterinarian who has overseen the Samatan market for over 40 years.

Next to a tray of glistening male livers, many of the female livers had red blotches with thick dark veins, “which is unfortunately something we find quite often” even though it doesn’t change the taste or texture, Villate said.

“Clients are surprised, so we have to make a big effort to explain to consumers that there is no danger — It’s purely visual, you can buy and eat them just the same,” he said.

But male or female, prices have spiked to between 55 and 60 euros a kilogramme ($26 to $29 a pound), or “15 to 20 euros more than normal,” said Constant, calling 2022 “catastrophic for the sector.”

For Gilberte Bru, who like dozens of others rushed in at the market’s opening whistle to stock up for the holidays, the decision was easy — she picked the male livers.

“Yes, because they are bigger,” she said.

The famed La Scala opera house in Milan was to kick off the new season on Wednesday with a gala and performance of 'Boris Godunov.'

Environmental activists hurled paint at the entrance of Milan’s prestigious La Scala opera house on Wednesday, part of a series of recent protests across Europe to focus attention on climate change. 

The early morning protest came ahead of the gala opening of the new season on Wednesday night, with a scheduled performance of “Boris Godunov”.

Five climate activists from the Last Generation group threw buckets of paint onto the facade of the building and inside the portico shortly after 7:30 am (0630 GMT), according to an AFP photographer at the scene.

Two people unfurled banners reading “Last Generation – No Gas and No Carbon”. 

“We decided to stain La Scala with paint to ask the politicians who will attend the performance tonight to pull their heads out of the sand and intervene to save the population,” wrote Last Generation in a statement.

Police quickly arrived on the scene — where bright pink, electric blue and turquoise paint had splattered onto the sidewalk — and the activists were detained and taken away in police cars. 

A team of cleaners from La Scala then began hosing off the building and the non-permanent paint appeared to have been entirely removed. 

Last Generation called on Italy to invest more in renewable energy and reduce carbon emissions. 

“In order to avert the misery of its own people and safeguard people, homes and businesses, which are at risk from increasingly frequent floods and heat waves, the government must act now,” it said, referring to last month’s landslide caused by torrential rains on the island of Ischia that killed 12 people.

Most recently, climate activists have targeted artworks inside museums throughout Europe in protests they say are designed not to damage the works but to focus attention on environmental disaster. 

They have targeted masterpieces such as the “Girl with a Pearl Earring” by Johannes Vermeer at The Hague’s Mauritshuis museum, Klimt’s “Death and Life” in Vienna’s Leopold Museum or Van Gogh’s “Sunflowers” at London’s National Gallery, hurling soup or other food at the paintings behind glass.

Last month at an exhibit in Milan, they covered a car repainted by Andy Warhol with flour. 

La Scala’s opening night gala is expected to be attended by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, President Sergio Mattarella and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. 

In light of the war in Ukraine, the choice of “Boris Godunov” — an opera by Modest Mussorgsky sung in Russian that tells the story of an autocratic ruler and his people — was controversial.

Ukraine’s consul in Milan had protested the choice, calling it a propaganda coup for Russia. 

Russian bass Ildar Abdrazakov will sing the title role. 

The inner region of the Orion Nebula as seen by the James Webb Space Telescope

The James Webb Space Telescope lit up 2022 with dazzling images of the early universe after the Big Bang, heralding a new era of astronomy and untold revelations about the cosmos in years to come. 

The most powerful observatory sent into space succeeds the Hubble telescope, which is still operating, and began transmitting its first cosmic images in July.

“It essentially behaves better than expected in almost every area,” said Massimo Stiavelli, head of the Webb mission office at the Space Telescope Science Institute, in Baltimore.

Already scientists say the Webb telescope, now orbiting the sun at a million miles (1.6 million kilometres) from Earth, should last 20 years, twice its guaranteed lifetime.

“The instruments are more efficient, the optics are sharper and more stable. We have more fuel and we use less fuel,” said Stiavelli.

Stability is vital for the clarity of the images.

“Our requirement was similar to that of Hubble, in terms of pointing accuracy. And we ended up being seven times better,” the mission office chief added. 

Public appetite for the discoveries has been fed by the colouring of the telescope’s images.

Light from the most distant galaxies has been stretched from the visible spectrum, viewable by the naked eye, to infrared — which Webb is equipped to observe with unprecedented resolution.

This enables the telescope to detect the faintest glimmers from the distant universe at an unprecedented resolution, to see through the veil of dust that masks the emergence of stars in a nebula and to analyse the atmosphere of exoplanets, which orbit stars outside our solar system.

– 18 petals –

“The first year (of observation) is a way to test out the tool for the small rocky planets in the habitable zone that could potentially be like Earth,” said Lisa Kaltenegger, associate professor in Astronomy at Cornell University.

“And the tests are beautiful. They’re spectacular.”

Webb blasted off aboard an Ariane 5 rocket at the end of 2021 crowning a 30-year project at the US space agency NASA.

It took 10,000 people and 10 billion dollars to put the 6.2-tonne observatory into space.

En route to final orbit, Webb deployed a five-layer sunshield the size of a tennis court followed by a 6.5 metre primary mirror made up of 18 hexagonal, gold-coated segments or petals.

Once calibrated to less than a millionth of a metre, the 18 petals began to collect the light pulsing stars.

Last July 12, the first images underlined Webb’s capabilities unveiling thousands of galaxies, some dating back close to the birth of the Universe, and a star nursery in the Carina nebula.

Jupiter has been captured in incredible detail which is expected to help understand the workings of the giant gas planet.

– ‘Too many’ galaxies –

The blue, orange and grey tones of the images from the “Pillars of Creation”, giant dust columns where stars are born, proved captivating.

Scientists saw the revelations as a way of rethinking their models of star formation.

Researchers using the new observatory have found the furthest galaxies ever observed, one of which existed just 350 millions years after the Big Bang some 13.8 billion years ago.

The galaxies appear with extreme luminosity and may have started forming 100 million years earlier than theories predicted.

“In the distant Universe, we have an excess of galaxies compared to models,” David Elbaz, scientific director for astrophysics at France’s Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission, told AFP.

Another surprise has been that where Hubble essentially observed irregular shaped galaxies, the precision of the Webb telescope produces magnificent spiral galaxies similar to our own.

This has led to musings over a potential universal model which could be one of the keys to star formation.

Webb also opened up a profusion of clusters of millions of stars leading, which could be the potential missing link between the first stars and the first galaxies.

In the field of exoplanets, Webb honed in on a faraway gas giant called WASP-96 b, which was discovered in 2014.

Nearly 1,150 light-years from Earth, WASP-96 b is about half the mass of Jupiter and zips around its star in just 3.4 days

Webb provided the first confirmation that carbon dioxide is present in the atmosphere of Wasp 39-b.

But for Stiavelli, “Some of the big things either haven’t been observed yet, or haven’t been revealed yet.”

The reputed home of the biblical Garden of Eden, Iraq's swamplands have been battered by three years of drought

Catastrophic floods, crop-wilting droughts and record heatwaves this year have shown that climate change warnings are increasingly becoming reality and this is “just the beginning”, experts say, as international efforts to cut planet-heating emissions founder.

The year did see some important climate progress, with major new legislation particularly in the United States and Europe as well as a deal at the UN climate talks to help vulnerable countries cope with an increasing onslaught of devastating climate impacts. 

But the goal of keeping warming within a safer limit of 1.5 degrees Celsius since the pre-industrial era appears increasingly in peril, with carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels — the main driver of global heating — on track to reach an all-time high in 2022.

United Nations chief Antonio Guterres warned world leaders at a climate summit in Egypt in November that humanity faces a stark choice between working together in the battle against global warming or “collective suicide”. 

They opted to put off the most important decisions for another time, observers say. 

This year UN climate science experts issued their strongest warning yet of the dangers facing people and planet, with a landmark report on climate impacts in February dubbed an “atlas of human suffering”.

Since then a series of extreme events has illustrated the accelerating dangers of climate change, at barely 1.2C of warming.  

Record heatwaves damaged crops from China to Europe, while drought has brought millions to the point of starvation in the Horn of Africa.

Floods super-charged by climate change engulfed Pakistan, affecting 33 million people and causing some $30 billion in damage and economic losses.

“The year 2022 will be one of the hottest years on earth, with all the phenomena that go with higher temperatures,” said climate scientist Robert Vautard, head of France’s Pierre-Simon Laplace Institute.

“Unfortunately, this is just the beginning.”

This year is on track to be the fifth or sixth warmest ever recorded despite the impact, since 2020, of La Nina — a periodic and naturally occurring phenomenon in the Pacific that cools the atmosphere. 

When this phenomenon reverses, potentially within months, the world will likely climb to a “new level” in warming, said Vautard.

– Still polluting –

Economy-battering climate extremes, which amplified the energy price surges for many countries as a result of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, provided the backdrop to last month’s high-stakes UN climate talks in Egypt. 

The negotiations did make history, with wealthy polluters agreeing to a fund to pay for climate damage increasingly unleashed on poorer countries. 

Pakistani climate minister Sherry Rehman called the move a “down payment on the longer investment in our joint futures”. 

But vulnerable nations and campaigners said the Egypt conference failed to deliver on the emissions reductions needed to curb climate losses and damages in the future.

“COP27 tackled the consequences of climate change, but not the cause — fossil fuels,” said Harjeet Singh of Climate Action Network.

To keep the 1.5C limit in play, planet-heating emissions need to be slashed 45 percent by 2030, and be cut to net zero by mid-century. 

At 2021 UN talks in Glasgow, nations were urged to ramp up their emissions reduction commitments.

But only around 30 countries have heeded that call, leaving the world on track to hot up by about 2.5C.  

– ‘Emergency room’ –

Guterres decried the failure of the climate talks to address the drastic emissions cuts needed, adding: “Our planet is still in the emergency room.” 

He has also urged nations to urgently address the other main existential crisis facing humanity and the planet — the loss of biodiversity — which is the subject of a crunch meeting in Montreal from December 7 to 19.  

Nature has been gravely damaged by human activity and the UN talks are tasked with outlining a roadmap for protecting the land and ocean ecosystems that provide Earth’s life support.

A series of potentially crucial climate milestones will then stretch through next year.

These will include spring meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank, following “a formal request to look at the international financial system and to review the role of international financial institutions” from the Egypt climate talks, said Laurence Tubiana, who leads the European Climate Foundation. 

The next UN climate meeting in November 2023 — held in fossil fuel exporter the United Arab Emirates — will see the publication of a “global stocktake” of progress on the 2015 Paris Agreement goal to limit warming to well below 2C, and preferably 1.5C. 

Tubiana, a key architect of the Paris deal, said the talks in Dubai will likely be dominated by discussion of the oil and gas industry and its financial contribution. 

The issue is likely to create “great tension”, she predicted.

Aerial view showing a tree with pink foliage sticking out in the Amazon rainforest in Amazonas State, Brazil

High-stakes UN biodiversity talks open in Montreal Wednesday, in what is being billed as the “last best chance” to save the planet’s species and ecosystems from irreversible human destruction.

Delegates from across the world gathered for the December 7-19 meeting to try to hammer out a new deal for nature: a 10-year framework aimed at saving the planet’s forests, oceans and species before it’s too late. 

“With our bottomless appetite for unchecked and unequal economic growth, humanity has become a weapon of mass extinction,” UN chief Antonio Guterres warned Tuesday at a ceremony ahead of talks.

Before he took the dais, a group of around half a dozen Indigenous protesters interrupted a speech by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, in a sign of the passions inflamed by biodiversity loss among the most impacted communities.

The official opening of the meeting, known as COP15, follows several days of pre-negotiations that saw very little progress on key issues, sparking fears parties may walk away without a good deal. 

Observers called for negotiators to urgently unblock sticking points on difficult items like finance and implementation, with only five out of more than 20 targets agreed so far. 

The summit “is probably the last best chance for governments to turn things around for nature, and to rescue our precious life support system,” Bernadette Fischler Hooper, head of international Advocacy at WWF, told reporters Tuesday.

– ‘Significant resistance’ –

Draft targets for the 10-year framework include a cornerstone pledge to protect 30 percent of the world’s land and seas by 2030, eliminating harmful fishing and agriculture subsidies and tackling invasive species and reducing pesticides.

Finance is among the most divisive issues as developing nations are demanding increased funding for conservation.

Earlier this year a coalition of nations called for wealthy countries to provide at least $100 billion annually –- rising to $700 billion a year by 2030 — for biodiversity. 

Some countries want to set up a separate funding mechanism for biodiversity, which wealthy nations have largely resisted.

The sticky issue of biopiracy is also causing roadblocks, as many mainly African countries demand that wealthy nations share the benefits of ingredients and formulas used in cosmetics and medicines derived from the Global South.

Implementation has emerged as another sticking point in recent days, with disagreements over how to ensure any final deal is put into practice — unlike its predecessor agreed in 2010. 

“There is significant resistance to having the robust monitoring and review mechanisms that we feel is necessary,” said a European source close to negotiations. 

– ‘Flexibility, compromise, consensus’ – 

The meeting, delayed two years because of the Covid pandemic, follows crucial climate change talks in Egypt last month that ended with little headway on reducing emissions and scaling down the use of planet-warming fossil fuels. 

China is chair, though it is being hosted in Canada because of Beijing’s long-standing zero-Covid policy. 

But China’s President Xi Jinping will be a no-show along with all other world leaders apart from Canada’s Trudeau — opting to visit oil-rich Saudi Arabia this week instead.

NGOs say the lack of world leaders at COP15 risks dampening momentum at the talks and could scupper an ambitious settlement. 

Elizabeth Mrema, the head of the UN’s Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), which oversees the talks, on Tuesday urged “give and take” among negotiators, calling for “flexibility, compromise and consensus.”

The talks come amid dire warning from scientists that the world is facing its biggest mass extinction event since the dinosaur age, with more than one million species at risk. 

Human activity has decimated forests, wetlands, waterways and the millions of plants, animals and insects that live in them, with half of global GDP in some way dependent on nature. 

With so much on the line, observers are calling for a “Paris moment” for nature — an ambitious deal in line with the landmark climate accord. 

United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres speaks during the opening ceremony of the United Nations Biodiversity Conference (COP15) at

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Tuesday slammed multinational corporations for turning the world’s ecosystems into “playthings of profit” and warned failure to correct course would lead to catastrophic results.

“With our bottomless appetite for unchecked and unequal economic growth, humanity has become a weapon of mass extinction,” he said, in a speech ahead of biodiversity talks in Montreal.

Since taking office in 2017, Guterres, a former Portuguese prime minister, has made climate change his signature issue. 

His fiery denunciations at the ceremonial opening of the conference, known as COP15, revealed the plight of the planet’s endangered plants and animals — an interconnected crisis — are equally close to his heart.

Before he took the dais, a group of around half a dozen Indigenous protesters interrupted a speech by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who is co-hosting the event with China.

They waved a banner that read “Indigenous genocide = Ecocide” and “To save biodiversity stop invading our land,” and chanted for a few minutes before they were escorted out, to a smattering of applause.

“As you can also see Canada is a place of free expression, where individuals and communities are free to express themselves openly and strongly, and we thank them for sharing their perspectives,” said Trudeau in response.

The meeting is not to be confused with another set of UN talks earlier this month, which were on climate and called COP27.

– ‘Paris moment’ for nature –

Nearly 200 countries have gathered for the December 7-19 meeting in an effort to hammer out a “Paris moment” for nature.

The challenges are daunting: one million species are at risk of extinction; one-third of all land is severely degraded and fertile soil is being lost; while pollution and climate change are accelerating degradation of the oceans.

Chemicals, plastics and air pollution are choking land, water and air, while planetary heating brought about by burning fossil fuels are causing climate chaos — from heatwaves and forest fires to droughts and floods.

“We are treating nature like a toilet,” Guterres said bluntly. 

“And ultimately, we are committing suicide by proxy” he added — with the impacts felt on jobs, hunger, disease and death.

Economic losses from ecosystem degradation, meanwhile, are estimated to stand at $3 trillion annually from 2030.

Ahead of the talks, AFP spoke to Elizabeth Mrema, the head of the UN’s Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), who said failure was not an option.

“For the Paris agreement to succeed, biodiversity also has to succeed. For climate to succeed, nature has to succeed, and that’s why we have to deal with them together,” she said.

Draft targets for the 10-year framework include a cornerstone pledge to protect 30 percent of the world’s land and seas by 2030, eliminating harmful fishing and agriculture subsidies, tackling invasive species and reducing pesticides.

The new goal will rely heavily on the involvement of Indigenous peoples, who steward land that is home to around 80 percent of Earth’s remaining biodiversity.

Divisions have already emerged on the key issue of financing, with wealthy countries under pressure to funnel more money to developing nations for conservation.

Hopes have already been tempered by the absence of world leaders: Canada’s Trudeau will be the only in attendance. 

COP15 is currently chaired by China, but it is not hosting the meeting because of the Covid pandemic.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres speaks during the UN Biodiversity Conference Youth Summit in Montreal, on December 6, 2022

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Tuesday slammed multinational corporations for turning the world’s ecosystems into “playthings of profit” and warned failure to correct course would lead to catastrophic results.

“With our bottomless appetite for unchecked and unequal economic growth, humanity has become a weapon of mass extinction,” he said, in a speech ahead of biodiversity talks in Montreal.

Since taking office in 2017, Guterres, a former Portuguese prime minister, has made climate change his signature issue. 

His fiery denunciations at the ceremonial opening of the COP15 meeting revealed the plight of the planet’s endangered plant and animals — an interconnected crisis — are equally close to his heart.

Before he took the dais, a group of around half a dozen Indigenous protesters interrupted a speech by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who is co-hosting the event with China.

They waved a banner that read “Indigenous genocide = Ecocide” and “To save biodiversity stop invading our land,” and chanted for a few minutes before they were escorted out, to a smattering of applause.

“As you can also see Canada is a place of free expression, where individuals and communities are free to express themselves openly and strongly, and we thank them for sharing their perspectives,” said Trudeau in response.

– ‘Paris moment’ for nature –

Nearly 200 countries have gathered for the December 7-19 meeting in an effort to hammer out a “Paris moment” for nature.

The challenges are daunting: one million species are at risk of extinction; one-third of all land is severely degraded and fertile soil is being lost; while pollution and climate change are accelerating degradation of the oceans.

Chemicals, plastics and air pollution are choking land, water and air, while planetary heating brought about by burning fossil fuels are causing climate chaos — from heatwaves and forest fires to droughts and floods.

“We are treating nature like a toilet,” Guterres said bluntly. 

“And ultimately, we are committing suicide by proxy” he added — with the impacts felt on jobs, hunger, disease and death.

Economic losses from ecosystem degradation, meanwhile, are estimated to stand at $3 trillion annually from 2030.

Ahead of the talks, AFP spoke to Elizabeth Mrema, the head of the UN’s Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), who said failure was not an option.

“For the Paris agreement to succeed, biodiversity also has to succeed. For climate to succeed, nature has to succeed, and that’s why we have to deal with them together,” she said.

Draft targets for the 10-year framework include a cornerstone pledge to protect 30 percent of the world’s land and seas by 2030, eliminating harmful fishing and agriculture subsidies, tackling invasive species and reducing pesticides.

The new goal will rely heavily on the involvement of Indigenous peoples, who steward land that is home to around 80 percent of Earth’s remaining biodiversity.

Divisions have already emerged on the key issue of financing, with wealthy countries under pressure to funnel more money to developing nations for conservation.

Hopes have already been tempered by the absence of world leaders: Canada’s Trudeau will be the only in attendance. 

COP15 is currently chaired by China, but it is not hosting the meeting because of the Covid pandemic.