IEU at the IUCN Leaders Forum Jeju 2022
Jeju
13 - 15 October 2022
Yeonji Kim, Junior Abdul-Wahab, and Josephine Wambui Ngala of the IEU participated in the IUCN Leaders Forum held in the southern Korean island of Jeju from 13 - 15 October 2022. The forum was the first edition of the IUCN Leaders Forum high-level event series and focused on "Building nature-positive economies and societies". IUCN's nature-positive approach applied current, rigorous universal standards and statistics such as the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, and focused on rights-based methodologies in delivering social equity. The forum defined a nature-positive future as "a global society that managed to halt and reverse the loss of nature from its current status, thus, reducing future negative impacts alongside restoring and renewing nature, to put both living and non-living nature measurably on the path to recovery." The conference also unveiled its "Contributions for Nature" platform, a tool that allows IUCN, including its members and commissions, to document conservation and restoration actions quantitatively.
Climate Change and biodiversity are fundamentally connected. While the rise in planet temperatures leads to biodiversity decline, biodiversity-based solutions can contribute to both climate change mitigation and adaptation. With that regard, the IEU organized an informal event titled "Climate Urgency: what are we learning from community-led adaptation, transboundary climate action and climate finance?". The event explored recent IEU evaluation findings on adaptation and climate finance in the private sector, as well as the interdependence of and relationship between climate change and biodiversity. IEU colleagues were joined by Doug Watkins, Chief Executive of the East Asian-Australasian Flyway Partnership (EAAFP) Secretariat, and Benjamin Singer, Senior Forest and Land Use Specialist of the GCF Secretariat for a rich moderated panel discussion.
