It's beyond great to see climate back on the geopolitical agenda: Biden & Harris' climate plan; new net zero pledges by China, Japan, S Korea, the EU; Johnson's preparations for COP26.

But has everyone forgotten the nature crisis? (Thread) https://twitter.com/BorisJohnson/status/1326206254293913600?s=20

The terrifying loss of biodiversity poses just as existential a threat to humanity as the climate crisis does.

Yet international media coverage of climate change is up to eight times higher compared to biodiversity. https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fevo.2017.00175/full

China is hosting the Convention on Biological Diversity COP15 next year in Beijing. http://sdg.iisd.org/events/2020-un-biodiversity-conference/

But Xi Jinping chose to announce a net zero climate commitment the other month, rather than a fresh commitment to reversing nature loss. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/sep/22/china-pledges-to-reach-carbon-neutrality-before-2060

President-elect Biden has an ambitious climate plan.

But it contains just two mentions of biodiversity, and the only substantive new commitment on nature is the '30x30' pledge that various world leaders signed up to recently.

https://joebiden.com/climate-plan/ 

Boris Johnson's forthcoming 10-point 'green plan' (due next week) is expected to contain just one nature-related pledge - also likely to be a repeated commitment to protect 30% of the UK's land surface for nature.

Don't get me wrong; 30x30 is a good pledge. But...

... The UK Govt is claiming around 26% of England is already protected for nature by National Park designations - despite these doing almost nothing to actually protect biodiversity.

The RSPB says only about 5% of the UK is properly protected for nature. https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/2d0ddb2e9a0346a7ba383c96dafdf297

My concerns are these:
- Nature rarely gets a look-in on the geopolitical agenda;
- Politicians think they've ticked the nature box when they're really talking about climate;
- 30x30 will end up being the only substantive nature pledge most world leaders make over the next year.

. @LouisaCasson has explored more of these questions about the geopolitics of nature (and how we put nature loss front and centre of world leaders' agendas) in this blog: https://medium.com/@louisacasson/can-coronavirus-make-politicians-take-the-loss-of-nature-seriously-bcafe4a3c10d

Coda: We are overshooting planetary boundaries on biodiversity far more (so far) than we are on climate change, according to Rockstrom et al: https://www.stockholmresilience.org/research/planetary-boundaries.html