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Biodiversity Offsets

Biodiversity Offsets


The False Promise of Biodiversity Offsets: Launch of a New Analysis by GFC

10th October 2024

The False Promise of Biodiversity Offsets & the Myth of ‘No Net Loss’   In a pivotal new analysis from the Global Forest Coalition (GFC), launched in the run-up to Biodiversity COP in Cali, Colombia, we take on the myth of “No Net Loss,” the history of offsets, and the real reasons this conservation tool appeals to the most environmentally and socially destructive industries   Download the analysis in English here   “The time for talk is done; it is …


Biodiversity Offsets: A Flawed Conservation Solution – New Analysis Debunks “No Net Loss” and Calls for Urgent Action

10th October 2024

Biodiversity offsets are a dangerous illusion—allowing corporations to profit while ecosystems are destroyed and communities pay the price, the Global Forest Coalition (GFC) warned today. Instead of supporting this failed strategy, governments and financial institutions must prioritize community-led biodiversity protection and uphold the rights of Indigenous People and local communities, women in all their diversities, and Afro-descendant communities, and recognize nature’s inherent value—one that cannot be reduced to a balance sheet, GFC said.


Civil Society Organizations Worldwide Warn Against Biodiversity Offsets and Credits

2nd October 2024

Over 270 civil society organizations and academics from around the world have voiced strong opposition to the use of biodiversity offsets and credits, warning that such mechanisms will fail to protect ecosystems and instead pose significant risks to the environment, Indigenous Peoples, women, youth, small-scale food producers, and local and Afro-descendant communities.


Resources – biodiversity offsets


Biodiversity offsets in Paraguay

Case study: Biodiversity Offsets in Paraguay Resources Biodiversity offsets are one of a range of market-based approaches to financing ‘Payment for Environmental Services’ schemes and so-called conservation easements (policies which restrict land use in various ways, to promote conservation). Conservation easements do not have to be market-based. They include policies such as the European Union’s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), which provides a subsidy to farmers who set aside land from production to allow nature to recover; and similar financial incentives …


GFC Joins CSOs in Calling Out Biodiversity Markets as False Solutions

24th July 2024

GFC has joined more than 200 organisations signing on to a civil society statement opposing biodiversity offsets and credits, arguing that biodiversity markets are being modeled on carbon markets, which GFC has consistently called out as dangerous and rights-abusing false solutions to the climate crisis.


Striving for gender justice in forest and biodiversity governance: reflections on our exchange and capacity workshop parallel to the international biodiversity negotiations

8th July 2024

WECF’s Annabel Kennedy shares updates from recent meetings and side events by the Green Livelihoods Alliance (GLA) held in parallel to the fourth meeting of the Subsidiary Body of Implementation (SBI 4) of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in Nairobi, Kenya. The meetings, workshops and events were designed to strengthen our relationships, exchange and learn from each other, and design actions supporting gender-transformative change in the GLA.


“Nature-based solutions” – another false, corporate pathway in the great greenwashing of the climate and biodiversity crise

12th October 2023

With key United Nations and Global Convention on Biological Diversity meetings taking place in Nairobi, Kenya this October, GFC’s Souparna Lahiri and Valentina Figuera Martínez raise the alarm on the infiltration of nature-based solutions into global climate policy discussions, showing closer analysis and rigorous scrutiny of their implementation reveal them to be a dangerous barrier to resolving the climate and biodiversity crises.

The UN Environment Program (UNEP) working group on NbS is meeting from October 9-13, while the 25th meeting of the Subsidiary Body on Scientific, Technical and Technological Advice (SBSTTA) of the CBD convenes in Nairobi from October 15-19.


The Good, the Bad and the Ugly: A Historical Deal for Biodiversity

10th January 2023

By Simone Lovera, published 29 December 2022 by Heinrich-Boell-Stiftung In German – Auf Deutsch lesen / In Russian – Читать на русском It was an awkward incident: right at the moment that the Chinese environment minister serving as chairman of the 15th Conference of the Parties to the UN Convention on Biodiversity (CBD COP15) wanted to adopt what has been touted as the “Paris Agreement of biodiversity”, the representative of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) asked for the floor …


GFC interviewed about the new Global Biodiversity Framework

21st December 2022

GFC’s Simone Lovera spoke with Inter-Press Service about the new Global Biodiversity Framework that came out of the UN Biodiversity Conference in Montreal (COP15) on Monday, December 19. In conversation with journalist Emilio Godoy, Lovera welcomed some of what was included in the last-minute agreement: [The accord] recognizes the rights of indigenous peoples and local communities, and of women. It also includes a recommendation to withdraw subsidies and reduce public and private investments in destructive activities, such as large-scale cattle ranching …


Press Release: Global Biodiversity Deal Calls for Divestment from Harmful Industries, Recognizes the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Local Communities and Women

19th December 2022

(MONTREAL, DECEMBER 19, 2022)—The Global Forest Coalition, Rainforest Action Network and Sinergia Animal joined the world’s Indigenous Peoples in welcoming the outcomes of the Biodiversity Conference of the Parties (COP15) which agreed in the early hours of this morning on a Global Biodiversity Framework that represents a significant step forward towards rights-based, gender just and socially equitable biodiversity conservation. After four years of negotiations, UN Member states spent the last three weeks hammering out the fine print of a Global …


Press conference: Billionaires versus Biodiversity: Is the CBD the New Twitter?

15 November at 16:00 Montreal — As high-level delegates arrive in Montreal for negotiations on the Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF), join experts from the CBD Alliance, the coalition of critical NGOs in the Convention, who will react on the biodiversity funding pledge that the Bezos Earth Fund is expected to announce, and present an overview and status update on negotiations on resource mobilization and the proposed Global Biodiversity Fund. Why is resource mobilization so important and what are the chief …


Joint Press Conference COP15: Biodiversity’s Paris or Biodiversity’s Copenhagen?

With the future of biodiversity on the line, UN member states meeting in Montreal this December are negotiating a new Global Biodiversity Framework that will guide conservation for the coming decades. Global Forest Coalition members and allies will present views and experiences from the ground, sharing knowledge and experience on what is needed to ensure the post-2020 framework represents a true paradigm shift towards a rights-based, gender-just, equitable and truly effective conservation and restoration of the Earth’s remaining biodiversity.  What …