On 29 January 2019, Dr. Zhou Jinfeng, the Secretary-General of CBCGDF and the Deputy Secretary-General and staff member of CBCGDF visited the Foreign Cooperation and Exchange Center of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment of the PRC. They met with the heads of relevant departments of the Center and the two sides conducted constructive talks.

Dr. Zhou expressed CBCGDF team’s honored to be the first batch of visitors on the second day of the Center’s establishment. Before it was renamed as the Foreign Cooperation and Exchange Center of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment of the PRC, it was the Foreign Economic Cooperation Office of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment of the PRC.

After the Center’s head detailed the development of the Center, Dr. Zhou first introduced CBCGDF on the occasion of the International Biodiversity Day in 2019 and will host a Biodiversity Conservation and Sustainable Development International Forum on May 20-22. CBCGDF have already sent invitations to prestigious personages including the Secretary-General of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), Professor Geoffrey Lipman, President of the International Coalition of Tourism Partners (ICTP), foreign diplomatic envoys, officials from the UN Environment, etc., and has received some acceptance for the attending the forum and its side events. The forum will also be prepared for the Fifteenth meeting of the Conference of the Parties of the United Nation's Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD COP15), which will be held in Beijing at the end of 2020. The head of the Center expressed their appreciation to CBCGDF as a NGO in the field of environmental protection in China to commemorate the preparations for the May 22 of International Biodiversity Day, and said that whether it is on May 22 or in other projects in the future, today indicates the good day of cooperation between the two parties.

In order to facilitate the substantive cooperation between the two parties in the future, Dr. Zhou systematically introduced the main areas of work and related projects of CBCGDF at the request of the head of the Center.

Dr. Zhou introduced that CBCGDF, as a national first-class society and after the implementation of the Charity Law of the PRC on September 1, 2016, was recognized by the state as one of the first 16 charitable organizations with public offering qualifications since 2014. Much work has been done on biodiversity conservation and green development.

Next, Dr. Zhou introduced the CBCGDF "China Conservation Area for something at somewhere" system (CCAfa) through the "China Conservation Area for great bustards at Changyuan". This system compensates for the fragmentation of protected areas by bringing together the strength of most volunteers, and effectively use the flexible characteristics of NGOs to establish China Conservation Areas. To date, CBCGDF has established more than 100 CCAfa sites. In November 2018, CBCGDF delegation attended the Fourteenth meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD COP14) in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt. During the meeting, the CCAfa was called “Other Effective Area-Based Conservation Measures” (OECMs) by international experts. Dr. Zhou also introduced CBCGDF through the filing of environmental public interest litigation (EPIL), requiring “Who demages, who is responsible”, as well as the cases on protection of endangered species pangolins, and the protection of the endangered plant species Acer pentaphyllum, etc.

In terms of international exchanges, CBCGDFF, as China's leading NGO, strives to tell the world about China's environmental story. It is worth mentioning that CBCGDF promoted the inclusion of the Tiaozini Wetland in the scope UN World Natural Heritage Application on the 13th Meeting of the Conference of the Contracting Parties to the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands (COP13) held in Dubai.

As the talks draw to a close, the head of the Center said that deeper cooperation with Chinese public welfare organizations such as CBCGDF should be further strengthened.

(Photo credit: CBCGDF)

Original Chinese article:

http://www.cbcgdf.org/NewsShow/4854/7500.html

By / Niu Jingmei