At the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg
in 2002 it was agreed to:
'achieve by 2010 a significant reduction of the current
rate of biodiversity loss at the global, regional and national
level as a contribution to poverty alleviation and to the benefit
of all life on earth'.
At the seventh Convention on Biological Diversity Conference
of the Parties (CBD CoP7), a framework of indicators was adopted to
measure the achievement of the target. The European Commission
Biodiversity Expert Group and a number of international meetings
have been considering how these indicators might be
implemented at European and Pan-European scales. This recently
culminated in the discussions at the Malahide Biodiversity and
the EU - Sustaining Life, Sustaining Livelihoods Conference,
which were welcomed by the June Environment Council.
The third UK Biodiversity Indicators Forum meeting was held at
JNCC Peterborough on 6 July 2004. The meeting, chaired
by John Custance, Chief Statistician at Defra, was an opportunity
for Government Agencies and Non-Governmental Organisations to
exchange information and consider a UK response to these
initiatives.
The agreement at the CBD CoP7 has led to significant progress,
and the processes for development of indicators at global, EU and
Pan-European levels have converged. There is now momentum for rapid
progress towards the production of global and European indicators
within a year to 18 months, leading to publication of a first
assessment in 2006.
The meeting reviewed these developments and looked forward to
the way the EU indicators would be developed (co-ordination
through the European Environment Agency and Biodiversity Expert
Group), and how these developments could, or should, fit with
global developments under CBD (for instance, via a liaison
group and ad-hoc expert technical group in autumn 2004, leading
into the 10th meeting of the Subsidiary Body on
Scientific, Technology and Technological Advice).
The expectation is that all the indicators will be based on
existing data. The intention is not to produce something perfect,
but which can communicate at a high political level and
substantiate the opinion that biodiversity is being lost. There is
flexibility in the framework for States to use similar but not
identical information within their indicators.
The UK (through Defra and JNCC) have expressed willingness to
be involved in this work – we now need to work out the best ways to
engage, including who to nominate to which group.
The meeting recognised the considerable work done in the UK on
indicators and monitoring and thought it vital for the UK to
continue to influence the international work and agreements on
biodiversity indicators based on our own experience. It was
recognised, however, that we should do this as a partner rather
than trying to impose our own practices.
Further information e.g. background papers, summary of
discussions are available on the JNCC website at
www.jncc.gov.uk/indicators
Contact file:
Dr James Williams, Reporting Standards Manager, Biodiversity
Information Service
Tel: +44 (0)1733 866868
Email: