On May 20th, 2022, the National Caucus of Environmental Legislators (NCEL) released a letter to President Biden urging him to develop a national biodiversity strategy.
Our planet is amidst a catastrophic biodiversity crisis, a crisis so harmful that states alone cannot solve it. U.S. states have been working diligently to conserve their plants and wildlife, but the threats to biodiversity come in various forms and don’t adhere to state boundaries; we must look to the federal government for help. This biodiversity strategy would not only protect, restore, and secure the prosperous biodiversity found throughout our nation but also solidify a better world for future generations.
The biodiversity loss crisis we face is only worsening as time goes on so it is critical that we take the necessary actions to combat this issue in an austere and rigorous manner.
The NCEL letter states that “The global scientific consensus is that as many as one million species are at risk of extinction” and that “Studies have shown that we are losing species and their habitats faster than ever before.”
As we continue to waste time thoughtlessly debating the severity of this issue, countless species are declining and habitats are degrading, which leads to humans losing essential ecosystem benefits that supply us with clean water, fertile soils, and the very air and food we survive off of. There are also several evident economic impacts of biodiversity loss. The World Economic Forum’s 2022 Global Risk Report identified biodiversity loss as the third most severe risk on a global scale over the next ten years.
The second most severe risk is extreme weather, and the first most severe risk is climate action failure.
This letter addresses the bold efforts to combat the biodiversity crisis already made by the Biden-Harris administration. America the Beautiful initiative addresses both habitat destruction and climate change, two key driving forces of biodiversity loss.
The Department of the Interior, Departments of Agriculture and Commerce, National Ocean and Atmospheric Administration, and the White House’s Council on Environmental Quality have been issued by President Biden to work together to conserve, connect, and restore 30% of our nation’s lands and waters by 2030 to better our economy, health, and well-being.
Finally, the letter lays out what a national biodiversity strategy should look like. It should address all five driving forces of biodiversity loss and include a plan to secure and restore essential ecosystem services, advance social equity and environmental justice, and coordinate a powerful and effective national response to combatting the biodiversity crisis on a national and global scale.
At OneNature, we have been passionate and vocal about the importance of devising both a national and global biodiversity strategy. Recently, OneNature participated in developing a collective position paper in response to the initial draft of the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework. This paper outlined the crucial links between animal welfare, human and planetary health, and wildlife.
The paper emphasized socio-economic sustainability over the sustainability of biodiversity, which is critical to meeting human needs in the long term. OneNature also recently participated in a New York Times Ad informing President Biden about the chance to prevent pandemics, cool the planet, and improve health security around the world through a national biodiversity strategy.
We are thrilled to see the concept of a national biodiversity strategy gaining traction and making its way to the White House. We are hopeful that the Biden Administration will take the request made by the National Caucus of Environmental Legislators into careful consideration and devise a national biodiversity strategy.