ESA Urges All Nations to Take Climate Action at COP28

An Urgent Call

The Ecological Society of America (ESA) calls on world leaders attending the United Nations Climate Change Conference of Parties (COP28) in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE), to pledge immediate action to reduce carbon dioxide (CO₂) and other greenhouse gas emissions to limit rising global temperatures initially to 2.0⁰ C and eventually below 1.5⁰ C above pre-industrial levels. Validated by COP15 in Copenhagen, Denmark in 2009 and agreed upon by the 196 nations attending COP21 in Paris, France in 2015, the 2.0⁰ benchmark has served as a guide for over 15 years. We also urge all nations to go beyond climate-change mitigation and dramatically expand efforts to promote climate-change adaptation efforts in vulnerable regions of the world.

The Promise and Excitement of COP28

ESA also conveys its excitement about the unparalleled opportunity COP28 represents to develop a pathway to end and reverse climate change because of the extraordinary advances in the kind of science and technology ESA facilitates. The use of the Global Stocktake will provide a first-ever powerful tool to help guide COP28 by assessing progress since COP15. The myriad, readily developed and implementable science-based solutions to ending the climate crisis await commitment by the world’s nations attending COP28.

The Scientific Consensus

The global scientific community, across terrestrial-, marine-, freshwater, agro-, and urban-ecologists, including practitioners in environmental health, natural resource management, and earth stewardship professions, have documented unprecedented changes in Earth’s climate system that have led to extraordinary adverse consequences for nature and people. Extreme weather events, including storms, droughts, fires, and floods, have become commonplace. Mass extinction has skyrocketed, destabilizing and diminishing the services nature provides. Food and water security have plummeted, and the spread of invasive species, pests, emerging diseases and their vectors have all been adversely affected by climate change. Climate change is compromising and, in some cases, overwhelming the ability of biodiversity, ecosystems, and people to ensure environmental sustainability and a resilient planet.

Addressing the Costs of Climate Change

The cost of climate change disruptions, the bulk of which is borne by the poor and vulnerable, are staggering, but COP28 provides the international platform necessary to address the economic challenges of climate change. The World Economic Forum estimates the cumulative cost of climate change to be $16 million per hour, with global costs estimated to be between $1.7 trillion and $3.1 trillion per year by 2050. The World Health Organization estimates that 3.6 billion people, nearly half of all humanity, are already at risk from climate change with a climate-related death toll that is rising by 250,000 per year.

The Good News

The good news is that the last few decades have seen extraordinary advances in the natural sciences that provide clear solutions ready for COP28 to embrace. Securing pollination of our crops, climate-smart farming, carbon capture through re-forestation, afforestation, and restoration, stabilizing fisheries through sustainable management and aqua- and mariculture, managing biodiversity to enhance the production of clean water and fertile soils, and preserving the integrity of wild areas enjoyed by fishers, hunters, hikers, and boaters, are just  a few of proven means for addressing climate change and improving human welfare.

Summary

The universal consensus among scientists tells us that immediate action is needed to limit rising global temperatures to 2.0⁰ C, and aim for 1.5⁰ C, above industrial levels to reduce and prevent the catastrophic environmental and economic costs of climate change. ESA strengthens its ongoing commitments to advancing science to facilitate decision makers seeking nature-based solutions to mitigate and adapt to climate change. Nature-based solutions are the strongest tools for policymakers to develop a path forward that will enhance resilience and sustainability.

As we start COP28 in the UAE this year, ESA is committed to:

• Accelerate the pursuit of ecologically based strategies to reduce emissions of harmful climate-warming gases,
• Advance development of nature-based efforts to enhance ecological resilience in landscapes faced with harmful climate change impacts,
• Focus our expertise to reduce the rate of biodiversity loss and loss of ecosystem connectivity that supports species and ecosystem responses to climate change,
• Foster the development of ecologically-informed policies, and
• Join forces with the Convention on Biological Diversity’s emerging post-2010 agenda to ensure 30% of land and sea areas are conserved and responsibly managed to create a nature-positive biosphere by 2030 in which climate change and other global change factors, trend in a positive direction.