New RSPB report: how to drive a nature positive decade of action

A new report from RSPB, A World Richer in Nature, outlines how global promises can be turned into a decade of action for nature by the UK Government and devolved administrations; getting nature positive in the UK by 2030.

At the upcoming global biodiversity Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) conference, COP15, held in Montreal in December, signatory countries will agree and adopt a new global biodiversity framework. This is a crucial opportunity to secure a transformative, nature positive plan that sets nature on the path to recovery. Adoption of the framework is essential for addressing the climate and biodiversity crises, putting Sustainable Development Goals into practice, and the future of life on our planet. The new global plan will be implemented nationally, including across the four countries of the UK and its Overseas Territories.

The report highlights that to meet these targets, the mistakes of the past must not be repeated. The RSPB Lost Decade Report, published in 2020, showed that despite promising to take action to halt the decline of nature under the last global framework in 2010, the UK failed to meet almost all the global targets.

The report therefore outlines seven steps for the governments of the UK to drive a nature positive decade of action. These derive from six areas to focus efforts on across the UK and the UK Overseas Territories: species recovery, protected areas, food and farming, fisheries, climate change, and finance. The seven priority actions are:

1. Shift to a nature positive economy. This means embedding nature into the heart of economic
   decisions and measuring and costing in nature’s true asset value, to ensure that investment flows back into restoring and stewarding the natural capital of the ecosystems that support us.
2. Strengthen, implement, and better enforce environmental legislation which provides a firm legal basis for the recovery of nature in this decade.
3. Develop, implement, and learn from robust plans and strategies to guide and deliver on the UK’s legally-binding environmental commitments.
4. Take holistic action which brings multiple solutions for nature. This will be achieved by embedding and prioritising nature recovery across governments, recognising its crucial role in our food system, economy, and for tackling and adapting to climate change.
5. Deliver and effectively deploy adequate and effective financing that genuinely drives change.
6. Underpin action with science, and closely, accurately and transparently monitor our progress.
7. Support and empower people to act for nature.

Read more on getting nature-positive in the UK by 2030 by reading the full report, A World Richer in Nature, on the RSPB website.