In the wake of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, governments, development institutions, and the private sector must work together to achieve a nature-positive recovery, said Asian Development Bank (ADB) Vice-President (Operations 2) Ahmed M. Saeed.
“One lesson we should all have learned, especially since the COVID-19 pandemic outbreak, is that we can no longer manage economic growth and environmental pressures separately,” Saeed said at the opening of a webinar on ‘Financing Nature and Diversity’ on Friday.
“Governments and businesses need to work together to navigate these challenges to achieve a nature-positive recovery.” he added.
According to an ADB press release, speakers heard how countries in the Asia and Pacific region are highly dependent on natural capital for sustaining their socioeconomic development, with an average of 30 percent of countries’ wealth highly reliant on natural resources, including forests, protected areas, agricultural lands, energy, and minerals.
Employment and revenue generation from natural capital are also significant, supporting millions of jobs and livelihoods. In the region, about 380 million smallholder farms provide about 80 percent of food.
But, Asia and the Pacific are experiencing severe natural capital decline, biodiversity loss, land use change, natural resource overexploitation, and pollution.
To redress this imbalance and promote nature-positive approaches, ADB is establishing a Natural Capital Lab, which will operate in four main areas.
