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TWN Info Service
on Finance and Development (Jan22/02) Biodiversity targets will not be met without debt and tax justice Resource mobilization debates in the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) tend to emphasize the amount of funding estimated as necessary to reach biodiversity targets. This outlook directs attention towards attracting new financing for biodiversity conservation, but risks paying far too little attention to the underlying economic drivers of biodiversity loss, which are intensified and unequally distributed as a result of the structure of the global economy (for more on this, see Beyond the Gap: Placing Biodiversity Finance in the Global Economy). In this comment for the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution, Dempsey et al. demonstrate how current structural conditions of the economy (such as overreliance on debt with highly unequal and unfair conditions) create the economic pressures that drive biodiversity loss, while undercutting public spending available for biodiversity goals, among other crucial public goods and services. They then propose two types of reforms that ought to be considered as part of the call for ‘transformative change’: tax reform and debt justice. Such approaches to biodiversity funding would more permanently counter the debt-austerity nexus that limits developing countries in particular from reaching their biodiversity targets, while beginning to right the historic imbalance between those who have economically benefited the most from biodiversity decline and those who have not. These are particularly important in the face of climate and biodiversity-related risk frameworks that could impede future access to capital of developing countries to address such issues. In light of the grossly insufficient international public finance currently committed to support developing countries to meet their biodiversity targets, such structural reforms should be on the table as part of fulfilling the common but differentiated responsibilities set out in Article 20 of the CBD. Current negotiations under the CBD to agree on a post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework should also integrate these imperatives. By doing so, public resources will be greatly mobilized and harmful financial flows deflated, while dismantling the political and economic structures that inhibit implementation of biodiversity policy in the first place. With best wishes, Biodiversity targets will not be met without debt and tax justice Jessica Dempsey, Audrey Irvine-Broque, Patrick Bigger, Jens Christiansen, Bhumika Muchhala, Sara Nelson, Fernanda Rojas-Marchini, Elizabeth Shapiro-Garza, Andrew Schuldt and Adriana DiSilvestro Nat Ecol Evol (2021).
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-021-01619-5 Approaches to financing biodiversity conservation tend to focus on funding gaps, but fail to address underlying political and economic drivers. We propose two strategies — tax reform and debt justice — to supercharge public financing for biodiversity and deflate harmful financial flows, while chipping away at the causes of state austerity. Full paper available here: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-021-01619-5
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