With little progress at Cop16 biodiversity summit, Africa demands more action
Home to diverse ecosystems like primary forests, peatlands and mangroves, Africa nevertheless faces severe biodiversity degradation. Despite the recent Cop16 conference in Colombia offering limited progress for protecting Africa's flora and fauna, analysts hope future efforts will address the continent's environmental concerns more effectively.
Africa is one of the world's richest regions in terms of biodiversity, but evidence has shown that these natural reserves are degrading significantly – which is bad news for the continent.
Most analysts admit that not enough came out of Cop16 – held in Cali, Columbia last month – and hope to see biodiversity issues taken more seriously.
Africa is also home to one third of the world's biodiversity, harbouring eight of the 34 critical biodiversity reserves listed by the NGO Conservation International.
But its biodiversity remains in grave danger.
Although the UN summit in Colombia aimed to turn words into action – two years after a landmark UN-brokered deal to protect nature from a massive wave of destruction – delegates could only assess on what little progress has been made.
Summit to save nature enters final day with disagreement on funding
For Zitouni Ould Dada, a senior advisor to the FAIRR Initiative and former deputy director of the Climate and Environment Division at the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), not enough progress has been made.
Read more on RFI English
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