Department of the Environment participates in IPBES-6 Plenary in Colombia

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Raphaël Simonet, Division Head in the Department of the Environment, is representing the Principality of Monaco at the sixth plenary session of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) in Medellín, Colombia.

IPBES, which was established in 2012, is an intergovernmental body open to all members of the United Nations. The sixth session, which is being held from 17 to 24 March, will be attended by around 800 people, including government delegates and stakeholders involved in the platform’s activities.

With the goal of improving the links between knowledge and decision-making, IPBES seeks to identify and develop tools and methods to support decisions that take into account all relevant knowledge relating to biodiversity and ecosystem services, whether this comes from scientific research, governments, non-governmental organisations (associations, companies, etc.) or local stakeholders.

During the sixth plenary session, summaries for decision-makers of the four regional assessments (Americas, Africa, Asia-Pacific, Europe and Central Asia) and the land degradation and restoration assessment are set to be approved. IPBES procedures and financial issues will also be discussed. Progress on a global assessment of biodiversity and ecosystem services and other thematic analyses and methodologies that experts from around the world have developed in recent years will be reviewed.

For the purposes of its reporting, IPBES has divided the planet into four regions, each of which has been subjected to an in-depth analysis that the 750 delegates will study in closed session. Their conclusions, as well as the contents of the reports, will be revealed in Medellín from 23 March.

On 26 March, a second summary will be produced on the basis of a fifth report on the state of the world’s soils, which are becoming increasingly damaged by pollution, deforestation, mining and unsustainable farming practices that impoverish them.

Over a period of three years, some 600 researchers worked for free on these assessments, which synthesise data from around 10,000 scientific publications.

The final result covers the entire planet, with the exception of international ocean waters and Antarctica.