India Pushes For New Biodiversity Fund: UPSC Daily Important Topic | 7 January 2023

■ India Pushes For New Biodiversity Fund-

✅At CBD COP 15, Montreal (Canada), 196 parties to the Convention are looking forward to finalizing negotiations for a post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF).

✅GBF is a new set of goals and targets to halt and reverse biodiversity loss.

● India’s View:

✅India, at the U.N. biodiversity conference, highlighted the need to create a new and dedicated fund to assist developing countries in successfully implementing a post-2020 global framework to halt and reverse biodiversity loss.

✅India further said that the Conservation of biodiversity should also be based on common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities (CBDR) as climate change also influences nature.

✅As the members of CBD finalize GBF there have been repeated calls for the inclusion of the CBDR principle in finance-related targets.

✅CBDR was established as the seventh principle of the Rio Declaration adopted at the Earth Summit in 1992.

✅It acknowledges that the states have common but differentiated responsibilities in view of the different contributions to global environmental degradation.

● Global Environment Facility:

✅The Global Environment Facility(GEF) is the only source of funding for biodiversity conservation. GEF also caters to other conventions like UNFCCC and UN Convention to Combat Desertification.

✅Developing countries across the world have been demanding a new and dedicated biodiversity fund because the existing multilateral sources are not up to the mark in meeting the requirements of the GBF.

✅The differences with rich countries on the issue prompted representatives from developing nations to stage a walkout from crucial financing talks.

✅It is observed that applying the CBDR principle to biodiversity conservation is difficult and there have been repeated disagreements between the global north and

south.

● Other Demand at CBD COP 15:

✅There are also efforts by several countries to build a consensus on eliminating subsidies that are harmful to the environment, like subsidies for fossil fuel production, agriculture, forestry, and fisheries, by at least $500 billion annually and utilizing this money for biodiversity conservation.

✅India is against the proposal of reducing the agriculture-related subsidy and redirecting the savings for biodiversity conservation due to various national priorities.