Youth propose transformative actions at school biodiversity forum
Plant a tree, reduce plastic use, and raise awareness among communities on the importance of biodiversity. these are the transformative actions students aged 14 to 16 suggested at a recent school biodiversity forum at liceo de los Baños in laguna.
the students suggested both individual and community actions.
With access to information and knowledge on biodiversity, the students also acknowledged their potential to raise awareness among communities on the importance of biodiversity in providing food, shelter, livelihood, among others, and the need to protect it.
asean Centre for Biodiversity (aCB) Public Relations Specialist niña Calleja encouraged the youth to follow through with their proposed actions.
“You, the youth, have so many reasons to participate in actions toward protecting biodiversity. You have a bigger stake in this, with more years ahead of you in this time of climate change and biodiversity loss,” Calleja said.
the school had invited aCB to hold the biodiversity forum.
Calleja talked about the richness of biodiversity in the Southeast asian region and the Philippines. Despite occupying just 3 percent of the Earth’s surface area, the region is home to 18 percent of all known plants and species.
Meanwhile, the Philippines is one of the world’s 18 mega-diverse countries, containing two-thirds of the Earth’s biodiversity, and between 70 percent and 80 percent of the world’s plant and animal species.
Calleja also spoke about the threats to biodiversity like pollution, climate change, and habitat destruction. She emphasized the need for both individual and coordinated actions to protect biodiversity, and elaborated on how these are interconnected.
“Your individual actions have a regional and global impact that affects all of us,” Calleja said.
She added that coordinated regional actions are important as many environmental issues go beyond nations’ boundaries, like plastic pollution in the ocean.
She shared about the work of aCB in coordinating and facilitating the actions of asean member-states in halting biodiversity loss in the region.
Meanwhile, aCB Executive Director theresa Mundita lim lauded the students in their proposed actions for biodiversity, highlighting the role of the youth.
“With their boundless energy and enthusiasm, the youth have long been partners in biodiversity conservation,” she said. She cited as an example the youth who are engaged under the aCB’s asean Youth Biodiversity Programme (aYBP) in a one-year biodiversity leadership programme.
Other youth under the aYBP had internships at asean Heritage Parks. aHPs are protected areas of high conservation importance. the aYBP is part of the European Union-financed project Biodiversity Conservation and Management of Protected areas in asean (BCaMP) being implemented by the aCB.
lim also emphasized the importance of reaching out to different sectors and audiences with aCB’s work. “We want to engage stakeholders across platforms, from high-level meetings at international stages to fora organized by schools and communities, like this school biodiversity forum,” she said.
two days before the school forum, lim spoke at the 23rd Meeting of the Subsidiary Body on Scientific, technical and technological advice in Montreal, Canada, during the side event “Catalysing Regional Cooperation for the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework.”
She talked about the rich biodiversity in the asean region and the need for regional and subregional cooperation in protecting biodiversity and in developing the post-2020 global biodiversity framework, a new paradigm to safeguard nature and its contributions to human well-being.
around 500 participants representing 118 countries attended the five-day Montreal conference.