Egypt’s Minister of the Environment Yasmine Fouad stressed the importance of establishing a special fund for funding to support developing countries’ conservation efforts.
This came during a consultation with the various regional groups on the side-lines of the UN Biodiversity Conference: COP15 in Montréal on Sunday.
The consultation was chaired by Fouad with the participation of the Canadian Minister of Environment during the ministerial plenary session on the global framework for biodiversity beyond 2020.
She also expressed her confidence in the Chinese presidency and entrusted it with the task of leading consultations with groups in cooperation with the Canadian minister to achieve progress towards the ambitious global goal and facilitate the negotiation process towards setting a general framework for biodiversity beyond 2020 to present it to the world and to future generations.
Furthermore, Fouad stated that consultations were completed with 10 regional groups over two days, and now the formulation of this framework is being started to lead the group consultations, which were characterised by a high level of cooperation and commitment to all parties.
The consultations included holding meetings with each regional group separately to understand its views, given then need to raise global ambitions and mobilise resources. She noted that all consultations focused on a number of goals because of their special importance to the parties.
Fouad also stressed that the process of raising ambitions must be matched by raising the level of implementation mechanisms — especially financing — the fulfilment of pledges by developed countries, and agreeing on financing mechanisms that enable developing countries to maintain and protect and increase the percentage of protected areas in their countries without affecting development paths and the sustainable livelihoods for local communities next to nature reserves.
