The Biodiversity Foundation is working on a priority line of action to promote lifestyle changes towards sustainability, focused on a general level in all productive sectors, but prioritizing actions in three key sectors in Spain: food, tourism and textiles, due to their economic and social relevance, the environmental impacts they generate and their transcendence as a lever of change for the transformation of people’s lifestyles, since between them they cover a large part of consumption decisions. The promotion of more sustainable lifestyles is a fundamental strategy to contribute to the recovery of nature, since the way we behave has a strong impact both on the use of natural resources and on greenhouse gas emissions and, therefore, on biodiversity and the effects of climate change. The program of actions is in line with the international reports of IPBES, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), and contributes to the achievement of the objectives of the European Green Pact and its strategies “From Farm to Fork” and on Biodiversity for 2030, as well as Spain Circular 2030 at the national level.
The LIFE SHARA project “Awareness and knowledge for adaptation to climate change” aims to collaborate in the construction of a society better adapted to climate change, cooperating with all the actors involved, generating knowledge and increasing social awareness.
Coordinated by the Biodiversity Foundation, it has had a budget of more than 1.5 million euros, 57% co-financed through LIFE funds, and has had as partners the Spanish Climate Change Office, the State Meteorological Agency, the Autonomous Body of National Parks -through the National Center for Environmental Education- and the Portuguese Agency for the Environment.
The duration of the project has been from September 2016 to October 2021.
Through its various actions it has been achieved, with participation, training and communication, to generate an important community of adaptation to climate change in Spain and Portugal. Public policies directly linked to adaptation have been promoted and new spaces for dialogue and participation have been generated to share and disseminate tools and resources, knowledge, learning and good practices on adaptation that have contributed to strengthen and improve governance and, therefore, to increase resilience to climate change.
In short, LIFE SHARA has managed to strengthen the components related to knowledge management, capacity building and governance, all of which are strategic areas for adaptation.
Since 2016, the Biodiversity Foundation has maintained a collaboration agreement with the Spanish Climate Change Office for the execution of PIMA Adapta funds, from revenues from the auctioning of emission rights, in order to contribute to the National Plan for Adaptation to Climate Change (PNACC) 2021-2030.
The main actions we manage through these funds are aimed at:
– Support actions that contribute to the development of the PNACC through grants on a competitive basis.
– Promote access to information on climate change adaptation.
– Carry out technical studies on impacts and risks derived from climate change and adaptation.
The Biodiversity Foundation, as a public sector foundation belonging to the MITECO, together with the OECC, will contribute to 54 of the 255 measures included in the Work Program (2021-2025).
The Platform on Adaptation to Climate Change in Spain, AdapteCCa, jointly managed by the Spanish Climate Change Office and the Biodiversity Foundation, is one of the basic tools of the PNACC for the dissemination of information and access to working tools on impacts, risks and adaptation.
Fundación Biodiversidad is part of the Scenarios Working Group – PNACC, established to promote collaborative work in the development of climate projections and the continuous improvement of the climate change scenario viewer.
Climate change is the greatest challenge facing humanity. It affects all regions of the world and all sectors of society. But it is also an agenda of great opportunities, an agenda for progress, social justice and the protection of our natural capital.
In the face of the climate emergency we are experiencing, the answer is well known: to achieve decarbonized and more resilient societies. Science calls for an unprecedented economic and social transformation that requires an informed society, a change in production and consumption patterns, and in people’s behaviors and habits.
The climate assemblies reinforce the existing mechanisms of participation and offer citizens the opportunity to intervene in an innovative way in the debate on what should be the paths to follow to curb and adapt to climate change.
The Ministry for Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge, through the Spanish Climate Change Office and the Biodiversity Foundation, has served as the technical and administrative support structure for the Citizens’ Climate Assembly during its mandate (December 2021 to December 2022).
