2020-03-04
On Monday (2), the city of Brasília welcomed the international seminar "The European and Brazilian experience in promoting the use and conservation of biodiversity". The goal of the event was to promote a dynamic cooperation and discussion on issues related to the sustainable use and conservation of biodiversity, based on both the European and Brazilian experience. Organized by the Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation (EMBRAPA), in partnership with the UNDP, the event falls within the scope of the Bem Diverso project and marks the beginning of the second phase of the Sector Dialogues Support Facility, managed by the European Union Delegation to Brazil (DELBRA) and a partnership between the Ministry of Economy and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MRE).
On that morning, European Union Ambassador to Brazil Ignacio Ybáñez participated in the opening panel of the seminar alongside Guy de Capdeville, Embrapa Director of Research and Development; Maria Cléria Valadares Inglis, General Head of Embrapa Genetic Resources and Biotechnology; and Katyna Argueta, UNDP Resident Representative in Brazil.
Ybáñez highlighted the actions of the European Green Deal, which aims to reconcile economic practices with the sustainability of the planet, and said that a new biodiversity conservation strategy is under development and should be presented in the coming months. "The topic that brings us together here today is extremely important. Biodiversity preservation and the responsible use of forest resources mean, in fact, a new development structure. Today's seminar, the field visits throughout the week and the sharing of experience between Brazilian and European researchers will contribute greatly to achieving the goals we so much desire," he said.
"We have knowledge and we really want to lift our people out of poverty, but in a sustainable way. We will continue supporting these actions because our focus is on sustainable agriculture and developing technologies that allow us to explore environmental resources in a way compatible with our preservation goals," said the director of Embrapa.
In her speech, Katyna Argueta, UNDP resident representative in Brazil, emphasized that the actions in progress value life on the planet and the well-being of its inhabitants, who depend on the conservation of our biodiversity. "Brazil has the richest biodiversity in the world and therefore significantly contributes to its conservation. These efforts not only strengthen an environmental culture that values our biodiversity, but also support decision makers in generating robust information to carry out actions aimed at the restoration and sustainable use of biodiversity," he said.
Dialogues
The seminar marks the beginning of the second phase of the Sector Dialogues, a cooperation instrument between the European Union and Brazil. Established in 2007, the project aims to promote the sharing of knowledge, experience and best practices of technical or political nature, or both, in topics of common interest and recurrent at different hierarchical levels. A first technical mission of Brazilian researchers was carried out in 2019, with several meetings in European universities.
After Monday’s seminar, the delegation of European researchers will go on to visit the Alto Rio Pardo Region, in the north of the State of Minas Gerais. The program will continue until March 7th, and the researchers will get to visit in loco the Bem Diverso project in the region. The delegation is made up of researchers from the Universities of Joensuu and Helsinki, Finland; University of Dusseldorf, Germany; University of Amsterdam, from the Netherlands; and the University of Cameroon.
The mission is also expected to discuss the sustainable use of biodiversity as a conservation strategy for the public policy agenda, as well as the access to credit and research development in science and technology. They also aim to establish a short-term agenda for scientific and technological cooperation between the European Union and Brazil, and lay the foundation for a well-structured environment for long-term cooperation between European and Brazilian institutions.
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