Biodiversity, people and places

Abstract

The international environmental movement is readying itself to celebrate its 40th anniversary since the Stockholm Conference on the Human Environment (1972). During these four decades, while conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity has become accepted as a necessary condition for sustainable development, local and context-specific performance for integrating conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity remains fragmented and unable to meet globally-set performance targets. The origin and evolution of the UNESCO (United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization) Man and the Biosphere (MAB) Programme and its World Network of Biosphere Reserves (WNBR) is analysed to draw insights that explain and help improve the mismatch between the rates of global evolution of ideas and local evidence-based performance to integrate conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity. The World Network of Biosphere Reserves of the UNESCO MAB Programme, now comprises 564 sites in 109 countries. This UN asset could serve as a platform for international cooperation and sharing of lessons learned from efforts to integrate conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity with the socio-economic and environmental wellbeing of humans.