TORONTO — More than 190 nations got together in Montreal this month to figure out how to protect nature from people. They came away with a deal for the world that is so vague, it’s difficult to assess what it means.
The United Nations biodiversity conference — dubbed COP15 to avoid the jargonistic tangle of the ‘Convention on Biological Diversity Conference of the Parties 15’ — lasted more than a week. It was hosted by the Chinese Minister of Environment, whose own country ironically doesn’t appear to give a dam on the Yangtze about environmental issues. China is the biggest polluter on the planet. On the climate change front, China mined a record amount of coal in 2022, according to Bloomberg News, and also produced a record amount of coal-fired electricity, according to Reuters.
The headline-making deal mandates that each country “conserve,” or not develop, 30% of its land and water by 2030. It’s not clear how this might apply in Canada, where over 80% of the land is uninhabited anyway.
Perhaps more important for Canadian agriculture is the requirement that each country cut the “risk” of pesticides by 50% by 2030, just seven years from now. This is likely more austere than merely cutting “usage” of pesticides by volume. The deal similarly calls for the signatories to cut in half “excess nutrients lost to the environment,” in an apparent blow to fertilizer usage, again by 2030. Canadians stood up and applauded this deal when it was signed.
Click here to see more...