Going 30x30 is critical to arresting global biodiversity decline

With biodiversity under ever greater pressure, ecologists and campaigners are looking to a bold plan to protect at least 30 per cent of the planet’s land and sea area by 2030. It was the celebrated ant biologist E.O. Wilson whose 2016 book, Half Earth, proposed, as the title suggests, leaving half of the planet to nature.

He didn’t live to see the agreement from nearly 200 countries at the Cop15 meeting in Montreal, Canada, in December 2022 to aim for what is referred to in shorthand as 30x30. While not quite half the earth, Wilson would surely have been happy that such a substantial stride was taken towards his dream.

In the modern era the idea of a “protected area” for nature was born out of settler colonialism; famously the first national park to be designated in the USA, Yellowstone in 1873, required the eviction of the indigenous people who had lived there for generations. It would be the model for further parks and reserves not only across North America but in Africa and the Indian subcontinent, and would lead to accusations of “fortress conservation”, much criticised for displacing local people, disregarding their knowledge of ecosystems and criminalising traditional uses.

You may think that this is dark and distant history but when the Irish State set about establishing a system of protected areas in the 1990s as part of the EU’s Habitats Directive it essentially followed the same pattern (albeit without the physical evictions of landowners). Farmers today are, as a consequence, very wary of what they refer to as “designations” that have delivered little except restrictions, low income and inequality.

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The cloud of past injustices hung over the proceedings at Cop15 in Montreal. The Namibian delegate demanded that the conference acknowledge the “systemic trauma” that came out of the “violence of colonisation” if we are to have “any hope at all of living in harmony with nature”, a sentiment that is widely, if not universally, shared in conservation circles. Last year a scientific review led by Georgina Gurney of the James Cook University in Townsville, Australia, noted that not only does the 30x30 target constitute a “massive scaling up” of area-based conservation but that it “must be accompanied by fundamental shifts in how it is implemented” if it is to succeed.

Indeed achieving the goal would require doubling the existing area under protection on land and more than tripling the area at sea. The researchers concluded that “‘fortress conservation’ that involves eviction of local people results in the most severe social harms” and called for a new model of nature protection “beyond the characterisation of people only as threats to nature...to that of stewards”.

When done well area-based conservation is remarkably successful in protecting biodiversity and local livelihoods. The International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), the principal authority in this field, goes so far as to say that protected areas are a “mainstay of biodiversity conservation” and are at the “core of efforts towards conserving nature and the services it provides us”.

Among those to campaign for 30x30 in Montreal was Brian O’Donnell, director of the non-governmental organisation Campaign for Nature, based in Colorado. He frames the target as a “key component to addressing the massive loss in biodiversity that we’re seeing globally”.

An important strand of his work is with indigenous peoples and local communities “given that they are front line defenders in many of the world’s most important areas for biodiversity”. He points to language in the agreement text requiring “free, prior and informed consent” and adding that “there has to be a recognition of territorial rights”.

“I think that is essential. If we are to have any hope for the success of 30x30 it has to be supported by, embraced by and led by local people. If this is imposed on people they will rebel against it. It won’t be durable.”

As well as local buy-in the areas that are targeted for protection are also of critical importance. O’Donnell is keen to point out that although they did not present a map in Montreal of which areas they felt needed protection, in reality biodiversity is unevenly distributed and so which 30 per cent of lands and seas are protected is as important as the overall target itself.

He says that protecting large areas of intact natural systems, particularly in the tropics, is more important than protecting 30 per cent of land in countries which have largely been converted to farmland. “That doesn’t mean those countries are off the hook. They should be providing financial resources and restoring what they can.”

He points out that it’s “important Ireland shows ambition in the marine environment” but also that as a rich country it should be helping countries which have higher levels of biodiversity but lack the money for conservation. This would also reflect how consumption patterns in rich countries frequently mean outsourcing biodiversity loss to these poorer places.

Ireland, represented at Cop15 by Minister of State Malcolm Noonan, signed up to the High Ambition Coalition for Nature and People which helped deliver 30x30 and which saw countries such as France and the UK commit to a 30 per cent target within their territories. Larger countries such as the USA and China have also signed up.

At home Mr Noonan recently published Ireland’s fourth National Biodiversity Action Plan (NBAP) and while an early draft included the 30x30 aim this was excised in the final publication (although protecting 30 per cent of our sea area remains Government policy). Currently the area of land in protected areas falls at around 13 per cent, which is below the EU average, while a big increase in Natura 2000 sites (designated under the EU’s Birds and Habitats Directives) has seen the area protected at sea increase from 2 per cent to around 10 per cent in recent years.

Dr Catherine Farrell is a restoration ecologist based in Co Mayo with extensive experience working with landowners inside protected areas. “I can understand why the 30 per cent target was taken out of the NBAP because there has been a huge backlash against nature conservation designations. What we have to do is get measures right in the areas that are already protected. I’d start with the areas we already have under protection.”

For this to happen, she adds, “starting at the top, government departments need much better communication. There has been a lack of understanding on statutory instruments, how they should be adhered to, and the guidance that is then given to farmers through the farm adviser network and how the sites are inspected by the department [of agriculture].”

“People are really important” Farrell says. “People need people to engage with them, not letters in the post. What I have found is that person to person engagement is needed to convey why a site is designated, or even that a site is designated. Many of the people we have worked with were half-aware that their site was designated, they would have got a letter in the post, but they would not have been clear about what they should or shouldn’t be doing.”

She praises recent initiatives towards “results-based” programmes that pay farmers in relation to conservation outcomes but is concerned that they are too short-term. “Time has to be taken to work with these farmers. When they are on board they are amazing.”

She believes “there is an appetite to work with nature” but that “we are at nothing if we don’t learn from the mistakes of the past”.

The NBAP does commit to identifying new conservation areas, although it falls short of setting a target. It is clear we need to improve the state of nature in those protected areas we already have but new national parks and nature reserves, using both public and private land, are powerful and broadly popular ways of engaging people with nature in their locality.

Aiming for 30 per cent of Ireland’s land surface for nature conservation is not only doable but essential if we are to deal with the ecological crisis. After signing up to the Cop15 agreement in Montreal, Ireland cannot simply leave it to other nations to do the work. But it is also clear that a new model is needed. One that is less top-down, with greater co-ordination between State agencies and local groups, and with more of a human face.

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