Forum Talk 5 - Linking biodiversity, climate change and a healthy environment
9 November 2021, 11.30-13.00 - Room 9 – Palais de l’Europe
Sponsored by the Bern Convention of the Council of Europe
INTERPRETATION: FR/EN
While the terms biodiversity, climate change and the environment seem to most people to be linked to some degree, often the underlying elements of those connections remain unclear. These concepts are, in fact, inextricably linked: improving the state of one will improve the state of the other; while the inverse is also regrettably true, as we see today with an ongoing, sixth, mass extinction of biodiversity.
A crucial element in this anthropogenic battle which we are all facing, is to accept the important circular ecosystem effect. Species of flora and fauna help regulate habitats which help in carbon storage thus reducing climate change, and thus ensuring a liveable and healthy environment for humans as well as other species. Our expert speakers will aim to boil down these different forms of connectivity into concepts accessible to all.
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Guzmán SANCHEZ
Strategic communications expert
Spain
Guzmán is a strategic communications expert with a particular focus in environmental subjects. He has extensive experience working in the public, private and third sectors, dealing with issues ranging from climate change or biodiversity loss to biotechnology or heath. Notably, he is the co-founder of Scienseed, an agency specialised in the communication of complex topics. Guzmán holds a PhD in life sciences and developed a 10-year research career in the UK, Spain, Germany and Canada.
Yuliia OVCHYNNYKOVA
Member of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe - PACE (ALDE)
Ukraine
Yuliia Ovchynnykova (Ukraine, ALDE) is a member of the Ukrainian Parliament and a member of the Committee on Social Affairs, Health and Sustainable Development of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE). Before being elected, she was Acting Dean at the Faculty of Biology of Vasyl’ Stus Donetsk National University.
Adam WEISS
Head of Programme: Ocean, Plastics, and Chemicals, Client Earth
Belgium
Adam oversees a diverse programme with four teams protecting human health and nature. He supports the Harmful Chemicals Team in making sure EU law protects people and the planet from toxic substances. He supports the Fisheries Team in making sure the EU’s Common Fisheries Policy delivers on its promise to eliminate overfishing and illegal fishing. He supports the Plastics Team in using the law to make sure that companies that produce and rely on throwaway plastic bear its real costs, so we can end the plastic pollution crisis. And he supports the Sustainable Seafood team’s work with market actors and policy-makers to get illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing out of seafood supply chains. Adam also sits on ClientEarth’s staff Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion Committee and on the Operations Management Group. Adam tries to bring his background in human rights and anti-discrimination to all the work he does.
Friedrich WULF
Head, International Biodiversity Policy, Pro Natura - Friends of the Earth
Switzerland
Friedrich Wulf, b. 1966 in Sindelfingen (Germany), is a Biologist and vegetation scientist by training. After working for several years as a field biologist, he turned his voluntary engagement for nature conservation NGOs into a profession, serving as nature conservation officer at regional, national, EU and international levels for BirdLife and Friends of the Earth Germany. Since 2008, he works for Pro Natura – Friends of the Earth Switzerland – as international biodiversity officer. He represents Pro Natura and Friends of the Earth Europe at the Bern Convention and, by way of the complaints system, has successfully convinced the Convention to adopt a set of recommendations (Nr. 169/2013) to improve the state of the Doubs river and its endangered fish fauna on the Border between France and Switzerland.
Vicky HRISTOVA
WFD Youth Delegate
Bulgaria
Maja PRAVULJAC
Legal Expert, Client Earth
Belgium
Maja works as a lawyer in the Wildlife and Habitats team where she focuses on hydro-energy projects and their impacts on rivers, species and habitats. In her work, she focuses on the protection of rivers in the Mediterranean basin (including Balkans) and works closely with other lawyers across Europe in ensuring compliance with the EU and international environmental law. Before joining ClientEarth, Maja worked as a paralegal for the international law firm CMS Cameron McKenna in Glasgow, after interning for the UNCITRAL Secretariat in Vienna and working for a private law firm in Bosnia and Herzegovina after her studies.
Tebelelo LENTSOANE
South Africa