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30 Apr 2009 : Column 347WH—continued
Huw Irranca-Davies:
That is very helpful. Many of the suggestions in that Science and Technology Committee report are being taken forward in the strategy. The
strategy will not replicate or prevaricate—it will propose what we need to do to improve marine science, and it will be well thought out.
I welcome what the hon. Gentleman has said about GM. There is a wide variety of views on GM, both in this House and in other UK Administrations, but it is absolutely right that we have balanced, evidence-based discussions on the benefits or otherwise. What can we see from the GM testing that has been done? What does it prove? I do not think that either side has entered the debate with a closed mind, but we should make decisions based on the available evidence. That must be a common theme of our consideration of environmental matters, including the potential impacts of GM on neighbouring fields, crops and so on.
A lot of good work is being done on GM, including by the Royal Society, which will report later this year. That will help us to debate the issue in a cool-headed way as well as to consider whether it has domestic or international potential. I welcome the balance in the hon. Gentleman’s comments on GM, as it can often be an emotional issue.
The hon. Gentleman raised a query about the Budget statement. That falls slightly outside my area, so if he is happy for me to do so, I will take the point back to my right hon. Friend the Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and ask her to write to him.
The interdepartmental group on biodiversity is important, not least in respect of the overseas territories. I am pleased to say that it will meet on 11 May to discuss Her Majesty’s Government’s strategy for biodiversity conservation in overseas territories, with which the Joint Nature Conservation Committee and others have been helping. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the Department for International Development, the JNCC and others will be there, which is good. We need something to get our teeth into, and the report will help. I look forward to reporting back.
The hon. Gentleman is right to say that the Government are now fully seized of the importance of bees. Bees are generally important in terms of biodiversity, and scores of beekeepers are lining up here to lobby us, quite rightly, on issues that are important to them as well as to society more widely.
I apologise, Mrs. Anderson, because I tend to respond extensively, so I will try to get through my comments quickly. The hon. Gentleman asked whether a country’s performance is a deciding factor in future Darwin grants. As I am sure that he knows, Darwin grants are made to project leaders, and developing or host country Governments are not directly involved. That is interesting, because it allows innovative projects that produce research and that involve groups on the ground doing the work rather than the Government. The benefits of the work being done on the ground have consistently shown me that that is the right approach. All projects are subject to monitoring and evaluation, and the results feed into consideration for future project proposals for specific leaders or, sometimes, for specific countries. Does Darwin have a direct contribution to the 2010 target? Not as such. There is no direct link, but we will be preparing a thematic study on its contribution to the 2010 target towards the end of this year.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Scunthorpe made an excellent contribution. I acknowledge his wide-ranging work on the issue and his continuing work with the Born Free foundation, the British Trust for Ornithology, Globe International and other organisations. He and I have shared a privileged role in such overseas initiatives. It is a genuine privilege; it leaves a mark, and it is something to be proud of. I note the comments made in this debate about the events happening on the Floor of the House, but it is fair to say that we have important business here in discussing the initiative and wider biodiversity issues.
My right hon. Friend noted that the budget had grown, but he remarked on the fact that it was brought forward. There has been shared support for the initiative in this debate, and we all hope that that shared commitment will continue and grow where it can. We are in difficult economic times, at least for the Government, but the commitment that I have demonstrated here shows our direction of travel.
My right hon. Friend’s personal observations on Darwin projects on biodiversity and livelihoods on the ground were instructive, not least because I now know how to keep elephants out of my garden. He is right to flag up the fact that the Darwin initiative, as I said in my opening remarks, not only yields environmental gains, but results in wider social and economic gains and improves people’s livelihoods, which, through line or thread, must run through much of Government policy overseas.
To update hon. Members on the overseas territories, it is worth pointing out that although environmental management is a matter for the overseas territories, we recognise that they have capacity constraints and often need assistance. Since last autumn, we have committed a further £200,000 to biodiversity in overseas territories to fund baseline surveys and other research and support conservation projects. That is on top of the flagship species fund of £50,000, the more than £200,000 in support for the agreement on the conservation of albatrosses and petrels and the added priority that we are giving the overseas territories through the Darwin initiative.
Since Darwin began in 1992, nearly £200 million has been awarded to biodiversity projects in overseas territories, and we are looking to do more. I am aware of the support among stakeholders for doing more in the overseas territories and of the significant biodiversity gains to be made there.
My right hon. Friend referred to the work of Pavan Sukhdev to put a value on environmental goods and services. When I was a lecturer a long time ago, we talked about such things. We started from the blueprint of growth and worked through how to measure environmental goods economically and whether we even needed to do so. The reality is that we must factor in the gains and benefits, as well as the losses, if we lose more habitat. Pavan Sukhdev’s work is innovative, exciting and groundbreaking, and the work of Globe International complements it well.
My right hon. Friend spoke about the effects of biodiversity enrichment on a local level in his constituency. Biodiversity enrichment includes managed realignment, a controversial but interesting area of my portfolio,
because of the gains that it can bring on all fronts. In his constituency, it has brought wins right across the board, which is excellent to hear.
My right hon. Friend mentioned many things. I can give him an assurance on ivory. As he knows, along with our international partners, we sanctioned the one-off sale of ivory to China, which caused some controversy. However, we will monitor carefully what is happening through the monitoring of the illegal killing of elephants programme and other initiatives, in order to see what impact that sanction has had. We certainly do not envisage sanctioning anything like that again—we see it as a one-off—and we will monitor it carefully as it goes forward.
My hon. Friend the Member for Stroud made a good contribution; he undersold himself as he rose to his feet. He rightly described the Darwin initiative as one of DEFRA’s and this Government’s best-kept secrets. It is, and we can do more. He said that we should produce an annual report. We do, and it goes straight to DEFRA’s website—it is there for everybody to see—but we could probably do a little more to circulate it to Committees, hon. Members and others. I will speak with my team after I leave this debate to see how we can publicise it more. The initiative is a success story, but we need to use it as an indicator for how we work across a range of areas to benefit biodiversity.
Mr. Morley: The Darwin annual report is excellent and deserves more circulation. Will my hon. Friend consider sending an e-mail to all Members of both Houses with a link to the Darwin website, because the report deserves more circulation?
Huw Irranca-Davies: That is a very good suggestion. On the back of the debate, I will do that. We ought to do it each year, as a matter of course. My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. For the benefit of busy MPs and busy peers in the other place, we can front-end it with a summary of what is being achieved and why they should pay attention to it.
Mr. Morley: And a nice picture.
Huw Irranca-Davies: Indeed. I agree with my right hon. Friend. The report is excellent and very readable.
My hon. Friend the Member for Stroud mentioned the excellence of the science base in this country, and he is absolutely right. I will be at Kew next week celebrating the “Year of Darwin” alongside Her Majesty—I promise that I will be in my best bib and tucker. Others from throughout the United Kingdom who contribute to our science base will be there, too.
I apologise if I have gone on for some time and hope that I have dealt with most of the issues. The Darwin initiative makes a huge contribution to conservation work internationally. It supports people’s livelihoods, the sustainable use of natural resources and poverty reduction. Like Darwin himself, the Darwin initiative has greatly enhanced scientific knowledge. A number of new species have been discovered as a direct result of projects, such as the three corals in the Galapagos Islands and the new species of orchid in Costa Rica.
Darwin projects also leave a clear and lasting legacy, as Darwin did. I often hear it mentioned that, to date, training provided under the Darwin initiative has reached
more than 50,000 people. That figure alone is confirmation of the importance of the programme and why it is so successful. Many Darwin projects are at the cutting edge of thinking in conservation science, increasingly exploring emerging issues such as climate change. As I mentioned earlier, the links between conservation, livelihood and poverty-reduction projects have involved working with local communities and helping them to develop local organisation and policies that strengthen their rights and responsibilities for the protection and management of natural resources. The funding that I announced today will help to continue building on those achievements.
Closer to home, we have made good progress, but we need to do more. We have made good progress in our priority areas and towards our biodiversity targets. We expect to meet our target to have 95 per cent. of the area of SSSIs in favourable or recovering condition by 2010. Through the UK biodiversity action plan, we have shown that we can be successful when we target resources at particular species and habitats. For example, the number of stone curlew nesting pairs increased to 351 in 2008, exceeding the target for 2015. More than 2,000 hectares of lowland heathland, one of the UK’s most threatened habitats, have been re-established. Environmental stewardship schemes to date have achieved 37,000 km of grass margins, which help to prevent the pollution of water and protect hedgerows from agricultural activities, 30,000 km of restored and newly planted hedgerows and 125,000 km of hedgerows under environmentally friendly management, providing nesting sites and food sources for birds and other wildlife.
But are we on course to meet the targets for halting biodiversity loss? The formal assessment of whether global and EU targets to reduce and halt the loss of biodiversity have been met will be in 2010. All countries, including the UK, have been preparing their reports for the convention on biological diversity, which meets in its 10th conference of the parties next year, setting out the actions and progress made. The UK biodiversity indicators that we published at the beginning of the month provide an overview of progress. As I said at the start of the debate, although there are some exceptions, the overall picture is that the rapid declines in UK
biodiversity during the last years of the 20th century have substantially slowed and, in some cases, halted. Our report to the CBD will show that we are unlikely to meet the target to halt biodiversity loss in its entirety, but that we are on course to meet it in some areas and to exceed it through reversing trends in others. It is clear that further progress is essential, and we are committed to taking action to achieve that.
As has been mentioned, we also need to safeguard the marine environment. I focused today mainly on land-based biodiversity, but the same principles and ambitions apply to our seas. We are committed to an ecologically coherent network of protected areas in our seas by 2012. The Marine and Coastal Access Bill, so well supported here today by hon. Members’ comments, combined with European legislation, will provide the systems and tools to do just that. One of the network’s purposes will be to protect areas that harbour rare and threatened species, or that are biodiversity hotspots.
Finally, we have to continue to play our role internationally through the Darwin initiative and our work on major biodiversity conventions. The next Darwin funding round will be announced this summer. It will continue to enhance our contribution to biodiversity work in countries where it is most needed and where the available resources are insufficient to address the issues involved. We must then secure international agreement on a successor to the 2010 biodiversity target. The existing target has galvanised action by Governments and non-governmental organisations the world round to tackle the most urgent problems, but now we cannot afford to lose that momentum, and we must redouble our efforts to achieve a halt in biodiversity loss.
I thank hon. Members for a worthwhile debate and for some well-informed contributions. I look forward to continuing this sort of debate in the months and years to come and to report on whether we are achieving, both domestically and internationally, our targets on biodiversity, not least through the Darwin initiative.
4.36 pm
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