DNA
ISLAMABAD: On Monday January 11th, French President Emmanuel Macron, jointly with the United Nations and the World Bank, will host a new One Planet Summit, online from Paris (from 02h00 pm to 05h00 pm – Paris time// from 06h00 pm to 09h00pm Pakistan time).
The aim of this One Planet Summit is to scale up the international community’s ambition against the erosion of biodiversity, at the dawn of a year 2021 that will see many international events on nature. Four key themes for the preservation of wildlife were chosen: protection of land and marine ecosystems, agro-ecological promotion, mobilization of finance for the protection and sustainable use of biodiversity, link between deforestation, species and human health.
This event will gather, around the President of the Republic Emmanuel Macron, heads of State and governments as well as leaders of international organizations, financial institutions, the economic sector and NGOs, that will make strong commitments for the preservation and restoration of biodiversity.
Key figures of achievements since first One Planet Summits in 2017 : 3rd “One Planet” summits since 2017; 121 countries involved in the coalitions; 5 public-private partnerships set up to mobilize more than $2 billion to finance the transition in developing countries ($472M available to date); 308 concrete research projects conducted by 3305 researchers worldwide.
Protection of the environment is an important topic in Pakistan, a country which is rich in biodiversity (from the arid deserts of Thar to the forested valleys of Dir and Kohistan) and fight against climate change is high in the national agenda as in civil society and public opinion interest. Pakistan hosted the IUCN Asia Regional Conservation Forum in November 2019.
The French embassy in Islamabad has encouraged media people to follow the summit and report it in their respective media.