UNEP-WCMC has been providing technical support to the work of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) on biodiversity and climate change. We carried out three reviews of the recent scientific literature and these fed into the deliberations of the CBD’s Second Ad Hoc Technical Expert Group (AHTEG) on Biodiversity and Climate Change. These reviews, entitled Links between Biodiversity and Climate change: Impacts, Adaptation and Mitigation, have now been published as no 42 of the CBD Technical Series (www.cbd.int/doc/publications/cbd-ts-42-en.pdf). This publication complements the main report from the CBD AHTEG which appears as CBD Technical Series No. 41 Connecting Biodiversity and Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation.

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The UK National Ecosystem Assessment (NEA) is gathering speed, with key messages on the status and trends of the UK’s habitats and ecosystem services due to be released in February 2010. The first meeting of the NEA’s Coordinating Lead Authors (CLAs) took place on the 29-30 October 2009. Linkages were developed between the broad habitat types and ecosystem services chapters of the NEA, and the Valuation and Human Well-Being components of the assessment were discussed in detail. The NEA has over 200 natural and social scientists and economists involved in the writing of this two-phase report.

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On the 6th November 2009, the Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources agreed the designation of the South Orkneys Marine Protected Area (MPA). Covering an area the size of Portugal, the Marine Protected Area comes into force in May 2010 and will prevent any fishing activity, refuse disposal and discharge from fishing vessels within its boundaries. UNEP-WCMC will include this MPA into the World Database on Protected Areas and will be available to view and download as part of the 2010 release. For more information click here.

September 28 2009 Cambridge United Kingdom. The United Nations Environment Programmes World Conservation Monitoring Centre (UNEP-WCMC) today announced that they have invited Safe Software into their Proteus Partnership a collaboration of progressive corporate business leaders and the UNEP-WCMC.

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The world could be doing better at tracking change in biodiversity and what it means for people. That is the conclusion of a UNEP-WCMC report and a paper in the journal Science, both published today.

The Convention on Biological Diversity has adopted a suite of indicators to measure progress towards its 2010 biodiversity target, and support to the delivery of these indicators is being provided by the 2010 Biodiversity Indicators Partnership (2010 BIP), a group of 40+ international agencies co-ordinated by UNEP-WCMC, But in a review of progress. the partners found that whilst major advances have been made there were still significant gaps in the development of the indicators and the content of the indicator framework at national, regional and global scales.

Lessons learned from the 2010 indicators process were considered by a group of 70 international experts at a workshop convened by UNEP-WCMC and the Secretariat of the CBD and hosted by the British Government in Reading, UK in July this year. The group identified a range of measures to improve indicator development and use that will help governments as they agree a new post 2010 biodiversity target and indicator framework next year.

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Further steps have been taken to strengthen the support provided by UNEP-WCMC to the implementation of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). Dr. Jon Hutton, Director, UNEP-WCMC, and Dr. Ahmed Djoghlaf, Executive Secretary of the CBD on 3 September signed a Memorandum of Cooperation in London that sets out a work programme of cooperation between the Convention and UNEP-WCMC.

The multi-year programme of work builds on an agreement established in March 2006, on the existing collaboration between UNEP-WCMC and the CBD Secretariat and Parties in order to bring the technical and capacity building expertise within UNEP-WCMC to bear on the improved implementation of the Convention. The cooperation aims to enhance, in particular, the preparation of the tenth meeting of the CBD Conference of the Parties to be held in Nagoya, Japan, in October 2010.