Union environment minister Jayanthi Natarajan, who chairs the Conference of Parties to Bio Diversity Convention, on Wednesday said all that she looked forward from the parties to CBD was a political commitment on resource mobilisation rather than resource targets.
Her statement comes in the wake of a difference of opinion among countries, especially developed, with regard to fixing a baseline for resource mobilisation by individual parties to achieve the biodiversity conservation objectives. “What I am looking at is a political target and an interim target. The parties have not come with a mandate on resources because the magnitude is so large,” Natarajan said.
Referring to the $100-million fund announced by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh yesterday, she, however , stated India had shown the way for other countries by this gesture and hoped others would follow this example.
Singh yesterday said $50 million would be utilised for capacity building in biodiversity conservation in India while another $50 million would be spent in other developing countries.
The issue of resource mobilisation to implement the strategy plan adopted at Nagoya in Japan two years ago has remained inconclusive and is expected to be decided by the ongoing plenary of the COP here.
Natarajan said she had so far held 10 bilateral meetings with countries and was hopeful of some consensus on criteria for commitment of resources by respective members of CBD by tomorrow.
The minister also said she had constituted a special group for this purposes and prepared a final draft for adoption at the conference.
The ongoing international biodiversity conference comes to a close on Friday.