Cop17: Ireland must fund nature protection, Minister tells summit

Ireland will have to come up with the money to protect the natural world, Minister for Nature Christopher O’Sullivan has told the Cop17 global biodiversity summit.

He said it was not enough that Ireland was first in the EU to present a national nature restoration plan if the plan was not backed by funding.

His comments come amid ongoing discussions with Cabinet colleagues on establishing a dedicated nature restoration fund.

O’Sullivan faced criticism from nature, climate and sustainability groups for failing to secure additional funding for the sector in last month’s budget.

That was despite the independent advisory committee on the nature restoration plan concluding €400-€700 million a year was needed to halt and reverse wildlife loss, habitat destruction and the death of rivers and lakes.

O’Sullivan told media at the Cop17 summit in Yerevan, Armenia, on Wednesday that Ireland needed to do more.

“As a nation that is doing pretty well economically, we have to look at ourselves in terms of how we fund nature restoration,” he said.

[ Ireland urges greater efforts to save nature at global biodiversity summitOpens in new window ]

“It’s all well and good us being first to produce our nature restoration plan – now we have to put money behind it.”

O’Sullivan is co-leading the EU delegation at the summit where funding for nature is a crunch issue.

Countries have made fresh pledges totalling $500 million (€443 million) towards a global biodiversity fund, but overall spending on biodiversity remains less than half the $200 billion a year they agreed to provide by 2030.

A financing mechanism called the Cali Fund was set up at Cop16 in Colombia with the plan that companies that make huge profits from nature – particularly pharmaceutical companies – would contribute to it, but it has received hardly any money.

“It’s not working,” O’Sullivan said. Countries were not giving up on the idea, however, and he said they made it clear in negotiations that they wanted it to work.

The Minister also said the EU was pushing for countries not helping with finance to start paying their fair share.

Countries classified as “developing” and exempt from contributing when the biodiversity Cops began include now-thriving economies such as China.

“Many of the biggest contributors are European nations and they have been happy to do so and will continue to do so,” he said.

“But it’s been 20 years since the list [of developed countries] was added to. Times have changed and there are new realities. We’d like to see modern realities reflected.”

[ Frustration at failure to deliver funding surfaces at UN biodiversity summit as talks go into final hoursOpens in new window ]

Almost 200 countries are signatories to the Convention on Biological Diversity and attend the biennial Cop summit.

This year’s gathering, due to end on Friday, has also focused on checking progress against pledges to halt and reverse biodiversity loss by 2030.

Assessments to date show patchy improvements, but that overall progress is far off target.