Recent Content Related to Biodiversity & Cultural Diversity

A Bittersweet Bargain on Biodiversity

Submitted by Laura Dunn on

Despite some small victories, the critical principles of justice and precaution lost ground at COP 15 of the Convention on Biodiversity (CBD), as business, billionaires and biotech-backers brokered a deal for biodiversity that would work in their interest

Two years late – and supersized beyond any previous CBD meeting – COP 15 was always going to be a complex multidimensional chess battle. Once all sides met in Montreal’s enormous Palais des congrès, an army of corporate and philanthrocapitalist lobbyists and big delegations from biotech-friendly governments used their superior numbers to drown out (and often literally edit out) long-standing principles of precaution and justice.

PRESS RELEASE -- Banners to Bezos and Gates: Back Off of Biodiversity!

Submitted by Laura Dunn on

Activists drop 80-foot banners at COP15 warning of Billionaire takeover of biodiversity finance and policy

MONTREAL/TIOHTIÀ:KE/UNCEDED TERRITORY OF THE KANIEN’KEHÁ:KA NATION – Climber-activists today dropped 80-foot banners reading, “Biodiversity versus Billionaires,” visible from Montreal’s Palais des Congres where world leaders are meeting at the UN’s landmark Biodiversity COP15.

Cashing in on the Climate Crisis through Agricultural Digitalisation

Submitted by Ronnie Hall on

Emerging Cases in Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines
Digital agriculture and climate financialisation illustration

Our new report explores how the climate crisis is being turned into an investment opportunity for financial actors, and how agricultural digitalisation is facilitating the commodification of climate into assets that can be traded. It highlights cases from Malaysia, Indonesia and Philippines.

Related Issues: 
Seeds & Genetic Diversity
Farmers' Rights & Food Sovereignty
Biodiversity & Cultural Diversity
Related Fora: 
Food and Agriculture: FAO, CGIAR, CFS

Over 80 civil society organizations call on CBD COP15 to reinforce precaution against geoengineering to protect biodiversity and communities

Submitted by Laura Dunn on

Eighty-three national and international organizations from forty countries have released an open letter

December 12, 2022, Montreal, Canada – Eighty-three national and international organizations from forty countries have released an open letter calling on the parties to the United Nations Conference on Biodiversity (CBD) to say no to geoengineering and yes to protecting biodiversity, the environment, the climate, the rights of Indigenous peoples and the human rights of local communities.

CBD COP15 needs to reinforce precaution against geoengineering to protect biodiversity and communities

Submitted by Laura Dunn on

No to climate geoengineering! Open call to CBD Parties and CBD Secretariat

The United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) took a groundbreaking decision by addressing geoengineering and its potential impacts on biodiversity and people early on.

Voices from COP15 in Montreal

Submitted by Ronnie Hall on

An interview with Christine von Weizsäcker of ECOROPA
Audio: 

COP15: An interview with Christine von Weizsäcker

by Zahra Moloo

(Click on the link below to listen to the interview.)

As preliminary meetings of the Open-Ended Working Group wrap up and official COP meetings begin, ECOROPA’s Christine von Weizsäcker talks to ETC Group about evaluating new genetic technologies and the rights of indigenous people in the Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF).

Landmark ‘nature’ COP taxis for take-off

Submitted by Laura Dunn on

Three targets in the Global Biodiversity Framework that could impact our planet's future

As newspaper headlines that warn of the increasing numbers of animal and plant life facing extinction become ever more urgent, delegates have begun to trickle into the Palais de Congres in downtown Montreal for the COP 15 global biodiversity summit under the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). The building is cordoned off on all sides by an astonishing number of police guarding the streets and patrolling on bike, cars and horseback.

As big oil states plan to promote energy-hungry agtech as a ’climate solution’ at COP26, it’s time to question their AIM

Submitted by Laura Dunn on

Banner challenging AIM for Climate on floor with La Via Campesina banners

By ETC Group

The USA and the United Arab Emirates both have vested interests in finding ways to justify continuing to extract and sell their vast supplies of oil. It is perhaps not coincidental then, that these two countries are planning a high-profile launch for what is likely to become a controversial climate and agtech initiative, “Agriculture Innovation Mission for Climate (AIM4C)”, at UNFCCC’s COP26 in Glasgow in November.

A Long Food Movement: Transforming Food Systems by 2045

Submitted by Ronnie Hall on

We map out two very different futures for food systems, people and the planet
Envisaging rice farming in 2045 under two very different food systems

First, what do the next 25 years have in store with “agribusiness-as-usual”? The keys of the food system are handed over to data platforms, private equity firms, and e-commerce giants, putting the food security of billions at the mercy of high-risk, AI-controlled farming systems, and accelerating environmental breakdown. But what if the initiative is reclaimed by civil society and social movements?

Related Issues: 
Seeds & Genetic Diversity
Farmers' Rights & Food Sovereignty
Biodiversity & Cultural Diversity
Related Fora: 
Food and Agriculture: FAO, CGIAR, CFS

Gana una copia del juego ¡Disrupción! Una batalla por el futuro de la alimentación

Submitted by Laura Dunn on

En las últimas décadas, la forma en que las personas cultivan, comparten y comen alimentos en todo el mundo se ha convertido en la historia de dos sistemas alimentarios en conflicto, a los que llamamos Cadena alimentaria industrial y Red alimentaria campesina. La tensión entre estos dos sistemas es la base de nuestro nuevo juego ¡Disrupción! Una batalla por el futuro de la alimentación. 



Our new game "Disruption!: a battle for the future of food"

Submitted by Laura Dunn on

Box containing a card game with illustrations from the game

Over the last few decades, the way in which people grow, share and eat food around the world has become a tale of two conflicting food systems – which we call the Industrial Food Chain and the Peasant Food Web. The tension between these two systems is the basis of our new game Disruption! A battle for the future of food. 

Video/podcast #3: Which new normal?

Submitted by Dru Oja Jay on

ETC Group on COVID, data giants, the food system and community responses
Those backing risky new technologies are seeing growing profits and power during the COVID-19 crisis. From fast-tracking genomic testing and novel vaccines to automation of ‘people-free’ supply chains, the pandemic is benefitting Big Tech.
 
From the rise of Zoom and Netflix to enhanced data-surveillance of populations, Silicon Valley and its financial backers  are not only shaping how the crisis is lived, but are positioning themselves to shape behaviours and write the rules in a post-crisis new order.
 

The Next Agribusiness Takeover: Multilateral Food Agencies

Submitted by Dru Oja Jay on

Stakeholders vs. Steak-eaters

Between now and late 2021, the World Economic Forum, agri-food conglomerates, IT companies and philanthropists (led by the Gates Foundation) have teamed up to spearhead three separate initiatives which could converge and utterly transform the multilateral agricultural system.

At stake is influence over four institutions with a combined annual budget of $11 billion and 5100 scientific/professional staff.

Was world conservation agency's report on genetic engineering and gene drive organisms rigged?

Submitted by Dru Oja Jay on

Clear evidence of bias and conflicts of interest found by monitoring group

JULY 8, 2019, MONTREAL–In a report released today, ETC Group exposes serious bias and conflicts of interest among members of an “expert” panel convened by the highly influential International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), the largest international body that convenes conservation movements.

VIDEO: Who Will Feed Us? The Peasant Food Web vs the Industrial Food Chain

Submitted by Trudi Zundel on

Peasant-led Agroecology and Food Sovereignty Feeds the World

More than a set of agricultural practices, agroecology is profoundly political, intertwined with food sovereignty and peasants’ and farmers’ rights. Small-scale farmers, peasants, pastoralists and small-scale fishers – who make up what ETC calls “The Peasant Food Web” – already grow 70% of the world’s food using only 25% of agricultural resources.

Do Not Betray Africa on SynBio and Gene Drives

Submitted by Dru Oja Jay on

CSOs urge African governments to support moratorium

As representatives of a broad range of African civil society organisations (CSOs), we do not feel represented by the delegations of Nigeria and South Africa, speaking on behalf of African Group, in their attempt to speak on behalf of the people of Africa on the issue of synthetic biology (synbio) and gene drive organisms (GDOs). 

From Terminator to Exterminator

Submitted by Dru Oja Jay on

20 years after suicide seeds, civil society mobilizes in Egypt this week to stop the sequel – Gene Drive Organisms
History repeating
  • It has been twenty years since ETC Group and allies uncovered a US patent on what became known as “Terminator technology” – seeds genetically engineered to stop farmers breeding with them. Civil society and farmer movements protested that these “suicide seeds” would threaten seed-saving practices that are as old as agriculture. 

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