At the sweet spot of climate actions – people, land, and biodiversity

M. Ann Tutwiler, Director General, Bioversity International writes a Guest Commentary for the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, during the second week of the United Nations Climate Change 2015 Conference.

As the world's leaders meet to agree on a shared plan of action for reducing global greenhouse gas emissions, their primary activity – negotiating numerical targets for thousands of indicators with inscrutable acronyms – can seem far removed from the realities unfolding in the physical world outside, where dramatic changes to rainfall, soils, forests, and wetlands are threatening the quality of life and food security of billions worldwide.

But those inscrutable terms translate into real changes that must be made, and one in particular deserves more attention than it is getting. 

LULUCF, which refers to the 'Land Use, Land Use Change, and Forestry' category for carbon emissions accounting, maintains a rather low profile in the negotiations, yet is charged with missed opportunity. A review undertaken by the UNFCC of the 119 national plans for mitigation (or intended nationally determined contributions, INDCs) reveals that although many make mention of LULUCF, only a few include specific targets or full descriptions of their approach to that sector.

Yet this sector holds huge opportunities for reducing emissions (by limiting deforestation and soil-eroding agriculture) and facilitating negative emissions (by planting more forests and using carbon-fixing farming). Concrete commitments along such lines can make a tangible difference to climate targets.

Read the full guest commentary by M. Ann Tutwiler on the Chicago Council on Global Affairs website: At the sweet spot of climate actions: people, land and biodiversity