UNEP - WCMC is working with the International Institute of Environment and Development (IIED) to support efforts at national, regional and international level to ensure that biodiversity conservation and poverty reduction goals reinforce each other and achieve a win-win-situation.

Conserving biodiversity and reducing poverty are global challenges, enshrined in both the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

Working in collaboration with IIED, the primary aim is to strengthen the evidence for the supporting role of biodiversity for sustainable livelihoods, thereby enabling poverty reduction (including poverty alleviation and prevention), and informing international, regional and national policy and practice.

The key focus areas of our collaborative work on biodiversity and poverty are:

• Evidence base: generating evidence for biodiversity – poverty linkages.

•Mainstreaming: reciprocal mainstreaming of the importance of biodiversity and poverty reduction/development and;

• Capacity building: developing capacity for generating evidence, mainstreaming evidence into policy and planning documents and translating evidence informed policies and plans into practice.