BONN, Germany (Landscapes News) — The picturesque city of Bonn, situated on the Rhine River in Germany, and known as a hub for accelerating sustainable development efforts worldwide, will be the setting for the eighth edition of the Global Landscapes Forum (GLF).
More than 1,500 participants will gather for the two-day forum at the World Conference Center from Dec. 19 to 20, with an additional 6,000 people expected to participate online, to define and launch the next five-year phase of GLF.
The forum is the first global movement of its kind, and the world’s largest science-led multi-sectoral platform for integrated land use, bringing together world leaders, climate negotiators, policy makers, development practitioners, private sector representatives, world-class scientists, civil society and the media to accelerate action towards the creation of more resilient, equitable, profitable, productive and healthy landscapes.
The GLF is now aspiring to expand its global community to reach 1 billion people by putting communities and local realities at the center of the conversation to contribute to the achievement of the Paris 2030 agenda.
A New Home
CIFOR, U.N. Environment Programme, and the World Bank launched the forum in Warsaw in 2013, alongside the UNFCCC Conference of Parties (COP). With core funding provided by the German government, the GLF is now entering its next phase (2017-2022), with the establishment of a secretariat in Bonn.
“We look forward to welcoming the hundreds of visitors that will flock to our city for the Global Landscapes Forum,” said Mayor Ashok Sridharan. “In Bonn, the German capital of international co-operation and sustainability, global environmental awareness is a crucial component of our historical and economic fabric, enriching our role in the wider community by encouraging awareness, friendship and social good.”
The former capital city, with its permanent U.N. campus, has emerged as a key partner for discussions on the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), 15 targets established by the international community in 2015 to eliminate poverty, socio-economic inequality and to protect the planet from the negative consequences of climate change by 2030.
About 150 non-governmental organizations focused on development co-operation, peacekeeping, renewable energies, and sustainable resources management are located in Bonn.
The 2017 forum will further conversations around the “landscape approach” to achieving the SDGs, which means they will explore how to holistically integrate the management of a range of different land uses and ecosystems under a single set of principals. Rather than segregating land-use types, they will consider how they are interconnected.
Currently, about 1.6 billion people, including 70 million indigenous people, depend on forests for their livelihoods and about 2.6 billion people depend on agriculture.
Agriculture and forestry produce food, energy, vital ecosystem services like water supply, biodiversity and land productivity, but they also produce one third of the planet’s greenhouse gas emissions.
Participants at this year’s forum will seek to improve livelihoods and sustainability by determining how to redesign ecosystem services, delivery of food and non-food products, and efficiently use resources while reducing their impact on climate change, among other relevant topics.
The five themes of the GLF include: Restoration; Finance; Rights; Food and Livelihoods; and Measuring Progress.
Since 2013, over 25,000 stakeholders from more than 3,000 organizations and 110 countries have engaged with the GLF.
To participate in the 2017 Forum, or to learn more, visit the GLF website here.
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