Blog by Tony Juniper CBE, Chair of Natural England
The extreme urgency of the climate and Nature emergency was brought home to us last week by the devastating flooding that struck Valencia, which provided a stark backdrop to the discussions on biodiversity at COP 16 in Colombia.
Those scenes were yet another chilling reminder that halting the decline of Nature, as nations of the world agreed to do last time round in Canada, is not a "nice-to-have" - it's a fundamental part of tackling climate change and a prerequisite for a healthy, secure economy and way of life.
I travelled to Cali as a member of the UK delegation and was struck by how optimistic the conference was. Some delegates afterwards were understandably disappointed at the lack of agreement on Nature funding and monitoring. However, I believe that if world leaders can return home with the ambition and energy they displayed in Colombia, and apply it to the work of putting Nature on the path to recovery as agreed in Montreal, this COP will have been a success.
This connection between local delivery and the global picture is the critical dimension in my view.
I spoke at a number of panels and roundtable events, highlighting some of the tools we are using to bring about Nature recovery in England, including our world-leading Biodiversity Net Gain policy and the Environmental Land Management scheme, which is transforming subsidies into positive payments for Nature recovery. These are among a growing number of tools that can enable positive relationships between economic and ecological goals, demonstrating how it will be possible to recover Nature while ensuring food security and sustainable development in a rapidly warming world. Delegates showed a striking level of interest in these emerging policies, revealing how important it is to share solutions whenever possible.
The leadership of the UK on this international stage, attended by our Secretary of State Steve Reed, Minister Mary Creagh and a number of senior officials, was very welcome. It played no small part in securing a major breakthrough on sharing the benefits from digital sequencing of genetic information. In addition to this the SoS displayed Britain's commitment to bolstering our 30by30 efforts, both by overhauling the criteria and setting out work towards a strategy to deliver this goal.
The close relationship between the global and the local was emphasised within a few days of my return home when I attended the launch of England's first Local Nature Recovery Strategy - West of England Nature Partnership - in Bristol. Our international credibility depends on being able to demonstrate that we are not just talking about Nature recovery, we are actually making it happen. Essentially, if Nature recovery doesn't happen in a place, it doesn't happen at all.
This groundbreaking LNRS is bringing together the local people, businesses and organisations with the ambition and ideas to make Nature recovery happen in a way which meets the needs of those living and working there. It will help to tackle water pollution and flooding and to bring more Nature closer to people.
If the West of England Nature Partnership can ripple out, inspiring the rest of the 48 LNRS, it will be a catalyst for the Nature Recovery Network and demonstrate to the rest of the nation - and indeed our friends across the world - that we can turn our environmental ambitions into reality.