The issue of biodiversity is complex. In a way, even more complex than the reduction of greenhouse gases (GHG). If the same quantity of GHGs emitted in Sydney has the same impact on the global problem of climate change as if it were emitted in Saguenay, the situation is quite different for the protection of biodiversity.
Of course, the issue requires global mobilization to take into account the problem and its seriousness, and to find solutions. But it simultaneously requires local mobilization to develop analyzes and concrete measures that take into account the specific characteristics of each region and each environment.
This is how, long before Montreal was selected to host COP15, SNAP Quebec, the Center for Biodiversity Science and Fondaction worked to better understand biodiversity in Quebec and the state of its integration. by finance. Our goal is to develop tools that will guide investors’ choices to preserve and protect nature and its essential services to populations.
In June, we organized a major day of reflection, with the support of the Secretariat of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity: Biodiversity indicators for Québec investors. For the first time in Canada, more than 80 players from the conservation, research and financial sectors, in addition to governments, have come together around a research project aimed at producing a series of specific biodiversity indicators. to the territory and to investors in Quebec.
Varied expertise
The economy must transform to meet people’s needs within planetary boundaries. For this transformation to become possible, we must be able to measure progress. Financiers are certainly key intermediaries who will enable the acceleration of change and the preservation of biodiversity, provided that they adapt to changes, that they work on the right things, with the right experts, and that they stay connected to the real issues. Hence the relevance of collaborating with conservation organizations, researchers and other interested parties.
If our sectors seem to impose distances between us, our common denominator brings us closer: we are determined to act together for the crisis of declining biodiversity in a proactive way that provides solutions for Quebec.
Although the international regulatory framework is developing rapidly with a proliferation of initiatives called to federate, it seems obvious to us that Quebec must develop local indicators to better measure the risks and opportunities arising from the way in which our investments affect our biodiversity.
This series of indicators specific to our geographical and social reality will complete the general framework developed internationally. For example, by providing precise and real-time knowledge of how an industrial activity affects the survival of our species at risk, or how an investment could obstruct or even promote conservation objectives in Quebec.
We are determined to be part of the solution, to bring together those who want to contribute to it, and also to create emulation effects, here, elsewhere in Canada and around the world.
There is no longer any question of competition when it comes to climate and biodiversity.