[ 2011-05-21 ]

UN calls for urgent action to save the forests
Accra, May 20, GNA – The UN has again
highlighted the dangers of the fast disappearing
forests and called for urgent action to halt the
development.

In a message to mark International Day for
Biodiversity, which falls on May 22, the UN
Secretary-General, Mr Ban Ki-moon, notes that the
benefits of forests are far reaching.

Forests catch and store water, stabilize soils,
harbour biodiversity and make an important
contribution to regulating climate and the
greenhouse gases that are causing climate change.


They also generate profits for international
businesses and provide essential income and
resources for hundreds of millions of the world's
poorest people.

“Yet, despite our growing understanding and
appreciation of just how much we reap from
forests, they are still disappearing at an
alarming rate,” says Mr Ban in a statement
released in Accra on Friday by the UN Information
Centre.

The UN says this year's International Day for
Biological Diversity is devoted to highlighting
the need for urgent action.

Mr Ban says this year's observance of the
International Day for Biodiversity falls during
the 2011 International Year of Forests, declared
by the United Nations General Assembly to educate
the global community about the value of forests
and the extreme social, economic and environmental
costs of losing them.

According to the UN Secretary-General, last year,
governments agreed on a new strategic plan for
biodiversity at the Nagoya Biodiversity Summit in
Aichi, Japan.

The Aichi targets call for a significant reduction
in the rate of loss, degradation and fragmentation
of all natural habitats, including forests by
2020.

He notes that one of the important tools agreed in
Japan is the Nagoya Protocol on Access to Genetic
Resources and the Fair and Equitable Sharing of
Benefits Arising from their Utilization.

Forests contain a vast – and barely catalogued
– store of biodiversity, says Mr Ban, adding
that the early ratification and implementation of
this Protocol can support forest protection and
the sustainable use of biodiversity.

This, in turn, can contribute to poverty
alleviation and sustainable national development.


Mr Ban says as the ongoing climate change
negotiations demonstrate, awareness is growing
that reducing deforestation and forest degradation
can play a large part in our response to the
combined threat of climate change, biodiversity
loss and land degradation and commends this
renewed emphasis on the importance of forests to
sustainable development.

He recalls that nearly two decades ago, world
leaders included the Rio Forest Principles as a
major outcome of the Earth Summit, which also saw
the birth of the Convention on Biological
Diversity.

Next year, governments will reconvene in Rio for
the United Nations Conference on Sustainable
Development (Rio +20).

“As we look forward to this landmark conference,
I urge all sectors of society to re-commit to the
management, conservation and sustainable
development of all types of forests for our
collective future,” says the UN Secretary
General.

Source - GNA

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