Saving Ecosystems to Protect the Climate, and Vice Versa: a Global Deal for Nature

A new study combines two approaches: protecting ecosystems like forests and tundra to combat climate change, and fighting climate change to protect ecosystems.

For years, experts in conservation and climate science have urgently pursued two parallel paths—one to interrupt a large-scale extinction event, the other to avert a runaway climate crisis.

Now, an international group of scientists is proposing a third way that marries the two in an ambitious plan they hope will save the species that make our planet so rich—including ourselves.

They set out their timetable in a paper released Friday in the journal Science Advances calling for a "Global Deal for Nature."  Its unified objective: protect the ecosystems to combat climate change; combat climate change to protect the ecosystems.

It aims to set aside 30 percent of the planet's lands for various degrees of protection from development and destruction by 2030, with additional protections for another 20 percent.  It also sets goals for conservation in oceans and freshwater ecosystems.

Read more at Saving Ecosystems to Protect the Climate, and Vice Versa:  a Global Deal for Nature