Synergy between the Convention on Biological Diversity and the UNFCCC in China

Abstract

The Convention on Biological Diversity and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change are the two most important environmental conventions for biodiversity conservation and climate change mitigation. Both conventions have carried out a variety of work and established a joint working group to promote synergy. This study reviews the cooperation process between both conventions, and identifies the gaps in the synergistic mechanism by analyzing the status of implementation in China. The following problems in China were found to be associated with convention implementation: 1) shortage of coordination among implementing organization; 2) the existing strategic plans lack planning for synergistic implementation; 3) the monitoring system lacks coordination management, thus making the sharing of monitoring results among each unit challenging; and 4) information sharing from partner ministries is inadequate. Combining the status of China's implementation and the experience of other contracting parties, the following strategies are proposed: 1) a synergistic implementation mechanism should be established at the national level; 2) a national strategic plan should be developed for synergistic implementation; 3) a monitoring system and management mechanism should be developed that comprehensively consider the monitoring indicators of each convention; and 4) an implementation information-sharing platform should be built.

Keywords

• Synergy
• CBD
• UNFCCC
• Climate change
• Biodiversity conservation