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WWF International: 2021 A 'critical Year' To Reverse Impacts Of Climate Change

Head of the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) International called for “urgent action” to secure the nature positive world and preserve the deteriorating ecosystems.

Written By
Zaini Majeed
WWF

2021 is a ‘crucial year’ for climate change and countries have only limited time to act and safeguard the future, WWF International Director General Marco Lambertini told Xinhua news agency in a recent interview. Speaking at an event after the nations plunged in dark to mark the Earth Hour 2021, the head of the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) International called for an “urgent action” to secure the nature positive world and preserve the ecosystems, managing resources by the year 2030 and raising hope for the  COP15 biodiversity conference to be held in China. 

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"This is the time to unite people, to speak up for nature," WWF International Director General Marco Lambertini told Xinhua, adding that 2021 was a ‘super year’ for nature and stability and world leaders must take decisive actions, particularly on climate deterioration. Governments worldwide must enforce tough policies and draft ambitious plans to tackle the environmental crisis, he warned. Lambertini also linked the pandemic and infectious diseases outbreak having a hazardous impact on human health to the destruction of nature. 

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"There has been new, shocking evidence about the condition of nature on the planet -- One million species driven to extinction, a two-thirds global decline in wildlife populations in less than 50 years, 90 per cent of fish stocks overfished in the ocean,” he said. However, he stressed that the pandemic has aligned focus on protecting the environment in a better way and it has proven that nature conservation is not just an ecological issue. "Because at the end of the day, we understand that we depend on nature more than nature actually depends on us," he stressed. 

UN says global warming goals 'not met' 

Earlier last month, the UN warned in a report that the world was far from achieving agreed goals to reduce global warming in line with the Paris Agreement on Climate Change.  UN’s Secretary-General António Guterres told Member States meeting for the preparation of the annual UN climate conference COP26 that the countries had remained way off target in staying within the 1.5-degree limit of the Paris Agreement. “We need more ambition, more ambition on mitigation, ambition on adaptation, and ambition on finance,” Guterres said, describing 2021 as a “crucial year” to fight against climate change. 

(Image Credit: Twitter/@WWF_DG)

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