The Prince of Wales applauds Declaration on PACC

The Prince of Wales applauds Declaration on Protected Areas and Climate Change

In August, 17 Latin American countries signed a Declaration to be presented at UNFCCC COP21 calling for the recognition of protected areas as natural solutions to climate change and committing to up-scale national and regional efforts to integrate protected areas in climate change strategies and include climate change criteria in protected area design and management.

This Thursday, October 29, HRH The Prince of Wales endorsed the Declaration at a high-level meeting on deforestation and climate change that took place at Lancaster House, London, hosted by the Prince's International Sustainability Unit (I.S.U.) and the UK’s Department of Energy & Climate Change. Amongst the participants at Lancaster House were the UK Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, the Rt. Hon. Amber Rudd MP; Ségolène Royal, French Minister of Ecology, Sustainable Development and Energy; Izabella Teixeira, Minister of Environment, Brazil; Mirei Endara de Heras, Minister of Environment, Panama; Tine Sundtoft, Minister of Environment, Norway and Robert Bopolo Bogeza, Minister of Environment, Democratic Republic of Congo.

“May I also take this opportunity to congratulate the Ministers from Latin America present for their recent 'Protected Areas and Climate Change Declaration', endorsed by seventeen Latin American countries, which calls for the recognition of protected areas, working hand in hand with indigenous peoples, as natural solutions to climate change”, said the Prince at the meeting earlier today. 

HRH’s support comes at a critical point in the run-up to COP21 in one month’s time, where the  Declaration on Protected Areas and Climate Change will be presented. The Declaration is an initiative led by the Latin American governments’ Protected Areas Network -REDPARQUES- with support of WWF’s Living Amazon Initiative (LAI).

“The RedParques’ Declaration is an excellent example of constructive collaboration across boundaries to tackle climate change. Signed by 17 Latin American countries, including 8 of the 9 Amazon countries, the Declaration offers the region and the world a natural and cost-effective solution to address climate change. The Prince of Wales’s praise today for the initiative taken by these countries will strengthen the declaration and hopefully encourage others to join”, says Sandra Charity, WWF Living Amazon Initiative leader.

The Declaration is one of several contributions the Amazon region is making to the ‘Amazon Conservation Vision’ developed by the Amazon countries under the Protected Areas Programme of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD – PoWPA).

For more information on the ‘Amazon Conservation Vision’ and the Protected Areas, Natural Solutions to Climate Change (NASCC) project, funded by the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Building and Nuclear Safety of Germany (BMUB), click here.
 

For more information on the COP21 events related to the Declaration click here and to read more on the Declaration itself click here.

The Prince of Wales Speech:

http://www.princeofwales.gov.uk/media/speeches/speech-the-prince-of-wales-meeting-about-forests-and-climate-change-lancaster-house