Posts by Mother Earth

Dear  Mankind and most favoured of my children 

You will recall my earliest blogs ( Mother Earth blogs ) welcomed the Global initiative to develop the Sustainable Development Goals ( SDGs)  to help create a safer and fairer world and I was happy that Mankind had at last understood the need to live more sustainably and harmoniously with other living things on this, our only, home. Some good progress was starting to be being made in some areas but sadly most of this encouraging activity was brought to an abrupt halt  or in some cases, even reversed by the COVID 19 Pandemic. 

This blog on SDG 17 – Partnerships for the Goals is the next in  a series of updates to review the effects of the COVID 19 Pandemic  on the aspirations and targets of each of the  original 17 SDGS and to look ahead to the prospects in each sector. 

The Covid pandemic has severely tested multilateral and global partnerships that were already shaky. Although Global Official Development Assistance  ( ODA) and Remittance Flows declined less than expected in 2020, Foreign Direct Investment ( FDI) to low-income countries dropped by 40%. This has caused severe economic  distress in many countries and limited their ability to make investments in recovery,  vaccines,  climate action and sustainability. Apart from renewable energy investment , investment activity fell sharply across all SDG sectors with the fall most pronounced in poorer countries. 

Exports from developing countries and least developed countries were supposed to be given preferential treatment and low tariffs so that their exports could be doubled  by 2020  from the 2011 levels but this was not achieved.  Agriculture(a particularly important sector  for developing countries ), continued to face the highest  ( protectionist ) tariffs imposed by the developed countries in 2019 despite their earlier promises on preferential treatment. 

In 2019, 86% of the population in Europe and North America were using the Internet so most people were able to work, shop and even learn remotely during the Covid lockdowns but nearly half of the Global population (3.7 billion people) are still not online. Significant efforts should be made to increase access to Internet in the developing world. 

The Pandemic has amplified health and income inequalities.  For example, persons over 65 were only 14% of confirmed cases but 80% of deaths , vaccine distribution in Europe and North America was  68 per hundred people but in  sub-Saharan Africa, fewer than 2 people per hundred got vaccines. For those with disabilities 1 in 3 personally experienced discrimination with higher levels of discrimination occurring to women. There was also  a drastic drop in international tourism and this disproportionately affected small island developing States whose economies were totally dependent on tourism. 

Mother Earth  

Sources : extracted from The Sustainable Development Goals Reports 2019 -2021 , United Nations, New York

Dear  Mankind and most favoured of my children 

You will recall my earliest blogs ( Mother Earth blogs ) welcomed the Global initiative to develop the Sustainable Development Goals ( SDGs) to help create a safer and fairer world and I was happy that mankind had at last understood the need to live more sustainably and harmoniously with other living things on this, our only home. Some good progress was starting to be being made in some areas but sadly most of this encouraging activity was brought to an abrupt halt  or in some cases, even reversed by the COVID  19 Pandemic. 

This blog on SDG 15 – Life on Land  is the next in  a series of updates to review the effects of the COVID 19 Pandemic  on the aspirations and targets of each of the  original 17 SDGS and to look ahead to the prospects in each sector. 

Forests are the repositories of most of the worlds biodiversity, covering 1.4 billion hectares  of land and help to regulate the water cycle, mitigate climate change and are a  direct source of food , income,  shelter and energy for over 1.6 billion people. Sustainable forestry aims to maintain and enhance the economic, social ,environmental value of all types of forests for current and future generations. Unfortunately,  efforts  to safeguard key biodiversity areas stalled over the last five years and the Global percentage of each key biodiversity area covered by ”protected areas” in 2021 was only Terrestrial (43%), Freshwater (42%) and Mountains (41%) and on average more than half of each key KBA remains outside of projected area status. More than ¼ of species assessed as being at high risk are threatened with extinction  and  this includes Amphibians ( 41%), Conifers (34%) Reef building corals (33%), Mammals (26%) and Birds (14%).

Ending environmental decline and restoring our Planet is fundamental to sustainable development.  However, forests are still being cut down and biological diversity is declining. Ecosystems are being degraded at alarming rates with a profound consequences for human survival and well-being and land degradation now affects 1/5 of the earth’s surface land Wildlife trafficking risks human health through diseases transmitted from animals to humans. 

Efforts are being made to expand sustainable forest management and to protect sites of critical biodiversity . Conservation actions and since 1993  have prevented the extinction of 21 to 32 species of birds and between 7 to 16 species of mammals.  However, biodiversity still continues to decline faster than at any other time in human history and the red list ( listing at risk species) shows an overall 10% decline since 1993. Despite efforts toward sustainable forest management, the world lost another 100 million ha of forest in just 2020 – with the rate of loss being greatest in the developing countries. 

Mother Earth  

Sources : extracted from The Sustainable Development Goals Reports 2019 -2021 , United Nations, New York