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🤔 When you think of biodiversity what comes to mind?

🐼 For us, our minds immediately jump to endangered wildlife, and—in particular—the image of a panda from the highly recognizable World Wildlife Fund (WWF) logo:

Aside from being a fantastic data analysis library for Python 📊🐍, pandas are of course a bear species that are endemic to China; although they were formerly present in parts of Southeast Asia (Vietnam & Myanmar) in the past too. They were once classified as “endangered” but within the last decade were re-classified as “vulnerable”—a one step improvement from their prior status—thanks to conservation efforts (The Guardian, 2016).

😂 On a related panda note, one of our favorite jokes about punctuation is:

Puns aside though, species of not just animals like pandas but also plants 🌱, fungi 🍄 and other organisms are a critical component in the fight against climate change. In the following section, we’ll dive into exactly why…

💭 So what’s the relationship between biodiversity and climate change?

First, let’s define biological diversity (abbreviated as biodiversity):

💸 Ensuring that nature remains in balance with biodiversity protected is neither simply an ethical nor environmental matter but also an economic one: with an estimated USD44T corresponding to half of the world’s GDP generated by industries that depend on nature (World Bank, 2021).

☹️ Unfortunately, however, climate change is threatening biodiversity loss…

As Elizabeth Mrema mentions above, biodiversity is also part of the solution. Our unique flora & fauna found across nature are a key part of maintaining ecosystem balance, particularly those that are considered Nature-based solutions (NbS) in the fight against climate change.

Key examples of potent NbS to sequester greenhouse gas (GHGs) include:

1. 🌲🌲 Forests, which cover 30% of the planet’s land and offer around 2/3 of all mitigation potential from NbS

2. 💦🌳 Peatlands, marshes, swamps and other wetlands that only cover around 3% of the planet’s land but have twice the carbon sequestration potential per acre vis-a-vis forests

3. 🪸🏝️ Ocean habitats like mangroves and seagrasses, which have up to 4 times the sequestration potential compared to land-based forests

📖 Source is UN’s explainer on Biodiversity’s relationship to climate change.

This is why protecting biodiversity to bolster nature’s resilience to climate change is so crucial. Unfortunately, however, nature is being threatened, with wildlife populations plummeting by 69% since 1970 (WWF, 2022).

Species that are endemic to Southeast Asia such as Orangutans 🦧 and Komodo dragons 🐉 are classified by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as “critically endangered” and “endangered” respectively (IUCN, 2023 & NPR, 2021). Animal species are not the only ones threated by climate change though; for instance, an infamously parasitic (and stinky) flower that’s endemic to Southeast Asia called Rafflesia 🪷 is also in danger of extinction (The Guardian, 2023).

📏 Solving this issue at scale is a major challenge because biodiversity is a complex concept and so it’s tricky to “measure the unmeasurable” unlike with carbon accounting where carbon dioxide is basically treated as a “global currency” to convert all other GHGs into (Eco-Business, 2023). However, there are attempts to quantify things in a more scientifically rigorous way, for instance, the WWF has created a Living Planet Index and firms like Accounting for Nature are making progress as well.

➕ One organization that is championing moving beyond the “net zero” goals of carbon markets is Nature Positive, which is advocating towards “nature positive” by 2030.

📚 Want to learn more about this topic?

1. “Biodiversity - our strongest natural defense against climate change” from The UN

2. “What is biodiversity? Why it’s under threat and why it matters” from WWF

3. “Nature in balance: What companies can do to restore natural capital” from McKinsey

📢 Shout-outs to Handprint & Silverstrand!

🖐🏻 Handprint’s technology enables companies to restore ecosystems that are critical for planetary health, in a transparent, digitized, and quantified way.

🔭 They are actively searching for critically damaged ecosystems on the planet and carefully onboarding the most powerful and verified on-site projects.

💥 As a platform, they allow them to access funding at scale and multiply the positive effects of these projects. Companies like Microsoft, Lazada, and Credit Agricole are already using Handprint to make a positive impact and unlock business growth.

📖 Check out their fantastic recent “Race to Regeneration” publication.

🚀 Silverstrand Capital, a fund that is on a mission to catalyze the widescale restoration and conservation of ecological health and biodiversity on land & sea. They also run The Biodiversity Accelerator+, a three-month, hybrid programme designed to scale businesses creating a biodiversity-positive impact.

🗞️ Recent News

👍🏻 Good News

🌴 Indonesia says 200,000 hectares of palm plantations to be made forests (Reuters, 31 October 2023)

🪴 The rise of nature-sustaining bio-businesses in Southeast Asia and Brazil (World Bio Market Insights, 10 October 2023)

🛡️ Indonesia pledges to protect marine biodiversty in high seas (Jakarta Globe, 21 September 2023)

🤠 Hundreds of species new to science discovered in South-East Asia (New Scientist, 22 May 2023)

👎🏻 Bad News

🌇 Human expansion found to pose widespread threat to biodiversity in Asia, especially in Southeast Asia (Physorg, 19 October 2023)

🪓 Forest loss from SE Asia rubber is up to 3 times more than thought, according to study published in Nature (Reuters, 18 October 2023)

🐢 A Southeast Asian marine biodiversity hotspot is also a wildlife trafficking hotbed (Mongabay, 7 June 2023)

🐬 Indonesia’s new capital raises fears for orangutans, dolphins and more (NBC News, 8 April 2023)

📢 Other Voices

➕ Conservationists push “nature positive” as biodiversity’s net zero (Eco-Business, 12 October 2023)

🔬 How can Malaysia’s businesses better integrate nature-related risks into their decision-making (Eco-Business, 20 September 2023)

🎙️ Interview with Dr. Lim of the ASEAN Centre for Biodiversity

💡 What have been the biggest challenges faced by biodiversity across the ASEAN region?

The region is currently faced with a number of challenges such as:

1. ⚖️ Complexity of balancing economic interest, human needs, and biodiversity conservation

2. ☠️ Species loss

3. 🪓 Overexploitation of biological resources

4. 🌫️ Pollution (land, air, marine)

🛠️ How exactly is the ACB solving it?

As the regional centre of excellence for biodiversity, the ACB, together with the ASEAN Secretariat, the ASEAN Member States, and dialogue and development partners are implementing the following programmes and projects:

1. ASEAN Heritage Parks Programme
   
   🏞️ First envisioned in 1978 as a group of national parks and nature reserves with outstanding wilderness and biodiversity values, the ASEAN Heritage Parks (AHP) Programme was established to highlight the importance of a select group of protected areas in regional and global efforts in biodiversity conservation.
   

2. ASEAN Green Initiative (AGI)
   
   💚 As ASEAN takes on actions for regenerating our environment, the AGI aims to set the standards for the recognition of the best ecosystem restoration activities that not only regrow our forests but contribute to peoples’ well-being, livelihood improvement, and resilience-building. Under this initiative, we endeavour to plant over 10M native trees across the 10 ASEAN Member States in a span of 10 years, in line with the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration.
   

3. ASEAN Biodiversity Heroes
   
   🦸🏻 Designed to recognise outstanding individuals from ASEAN who have contributed significantly to biodiversity conservation and advocacy efforts in their respective countries and the region. The Heroes will be the faces of biodiversity conservation in the region—individuals who people can identify with and will inspire others to take action.
   

4. ASEAN Youth Biodiversity Leaders Programme
   
   🧑🏻‍🏫 To empower ASEAN’s youth to contribute to the formulation and implementation of biodiversity policies, the ACB spearheads this program in collaboration with the Global Youth Biodiversity Network, the official youth constituency to the Convention on Biological Diversity.

😲 What is a surprising fact about Biodiversity?

🦋 Biodiversity is not just about species, it’s about the genetic diversity within species, the diversity of habitats, and the large biological units known as biomes. This includes the interactions that occur between species within ecosystems—primordial relationships that shape our environment in countless, often unseen ways.

😱 Based on fossil records and current data, scientists have determined that we are already losing a substantial number of species within a short geological period, suggesting that we may be on the verge of a sixth mass extinction. But unlike prehistoric extinctions, the dire situation we are in now, as far as species diversity is concerned, is highly avoidable.

📝 What brought us here can be traced to the choices we, as humanity, have made throughout our history.

🧑🏻‍🔬 Now, with the wisdom of hindsight and the benefit of modern research and science and technology, we have a better appreciation of how having a harmonious co-existence with nature and other species is vital to our survival and our way of life.

🎬 What actions can readers take now to support your cause?

🤝 Take part in community-based initiatives or national programmes supporting conservation of biodiversity such as coastal cleanup, native tree planting, mangrove rehabilitation, public education on solid waste management, sharing knowledge about the importance of biodiversity, and many others:

1. 💐 Initiate projects that will help promote biodiversity and your conservation

2. 🚶🏻 Walk the talk, i.e., having awareness of your own environmental impacts such as carbon footprint and try to reduce them

3. 📢 Encourage more citizens to be advocates for the environment

🦸🏻 What do you do when you’re not saving the world?

Spending more time with my family and doing things close to my heart like scuba diving 🤿, nature walks 🚶🏻, cuddling my dog (Typhoon) 🐕, baking 🧑🏻‍🍳, or cultivating my home garden 🧑🏻‍🌾.

⏭️ Next week, we’ll be discussing the challenges of keeping cool 🧊 on a heating planet 🥵.

❓ Did you enjoy this week’s issue? If yes, please do forward to your friends who would enjoy the read as well. Also, feel free to let us know what you thought by giving us feedback at [email protected].

🌊 SEA you next week!

Karina & Massimiliano