National and International Action for Biodiversity

International conventions relating to biodiversity have catalysed action on regional, national, and international levels. They have created shared goals and cooperation for the conservation of biodiversity. The most famous and influential is the Convention on Biological Diversity, adopted at the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro which was ratified by 168 countries prior to it entering into force in 1993. Other conventions such as The Convention on Wetlands also continue to provide a framework for national and international biodiversity conservation.

Since 1992, the Conference of the Parties (COP) to the Convention on Biological Diversity has met at least every two years to make progress on the implementation of the convention. The convention and its COP meetings has been the primary influence in development of government strategies and approaches to conserve biodiversity throughout the UK. In 2012, at the Rio+20 Conference, biodiversity and associated ecosystem services were considered to be at the heart of sustainable development and a new strategic plan for biodiversity emerged.

Current strategies throughout the UK have responded to the agreement made in 2010 at the Biodiversity Summit in Nagoya to halt the loss of biodiversity by 2020. Over 190 countries are part of the agreement and the European Commission has adopted the commitment as its overarching biodiversity conservation target.

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National and International Action for Biodiversity

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