What trade means for biodiversity
Marcus Nyman – RSPB
This year marks the centenary of the Importation of Plumage (Prohibition) Act – landmark legislation that outlawed the trade in bird feathers into the UK. The Act represented a milestone in a decades-long, female-led campaign to halt the worldwide and industrial-scale killing of birds to supply plumage to the fashion industry in Britain. The campaign also gave rise to the founding of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) in 1889, today the largest wildlife conservation charity in Europe. While our primary concern is no longer the feather trade, trade does continue to have major implications for the prospects of wildlife and biodiversity globally. While much attention has rightly been directed towards the impact of trade policy on animal welfare and food safety considerations, less mention has been made as to why trade matters for nature and biodiversity. As the Dasgupta Review makes clear, patterns of trade have major implications for the future prospects of biodiversity, with land use for export production attributing as much as 25 per cent of global species loss. With the UK embarking on a new approach to trade and with upcoming international summits on global biodiversity, it’s a helpful moment to outline the ways in which trade can impact biodiversity and the kinds of approaches that can improve these policy outcomes.
How trade can impact nature
With the recently concluded trade agreement between the UK and the EU explicitly recognising the implications and interconnections of trade and/for biodiversity, below we capture six pathways through which trade can impact (positively and negatively) on the prospects of biodiversity in the UK and globally:
1. Impacts of goods themselves
The goods we import can themselves have direct impacts on biodiversity in the UK. A good example is the import and use of pesticides and chemicals in the UK. This can cover the trade in ‘raw’ chemicals to be used in goods produced in the UK, chemicals used in industrial processes, ‘active substances’ in products (particularly pesticides), or the residues of chemicals left on goods. Depending on the products and how they are used, these can find their way into ecosystems – particularly through water pollution – and can have serious negative impacts on habitats and species, in addition to human health. Outside of the EU, the UK has been developing its own, independent – and potentially less rigorous – system for chemical authorisation. With many potential partners in trade agreements adopting different regulatory approaches to chemicals – what is allowed, how much is acceptable in products, and how they can be used – too many concessions through UK trade policy could result in products entering the UK that would otherwise be banned. For example, Australia permits the use of nearly twice the number Highly Hazardous Pesticides in farming as the UK does. The UK will remain in nominal control of its regulations but liberalised trade, coupled with inadequate systems of approvals could facilitate the import of new and potentially environmentally damaging products. And yet at the same time, increased and improved trade can also facilitate and lower the costs of accessing technologies to support biodiversity – from digital tech to support conservation efforts to agri-tech with lower impacts on nature.
2. Production methods
Global demand for tropical commodities has resulted in widespread destruction of nature. As RSPB and WWF have demonstrated, UK demand for key commodity goods contributes to an enormous external ecological footprint, often impacting vulnerable and biodiverse habitats and endangering a host of rare and important species globally. This often comes about through the conversion of forests into land for agricultural production or to supply timber, forcing wildlife into smaller and increasingly less connected pockets of habitat, as well intensive management practices impacting biodiversity through soil degradation and water pollution. Many of these commodities can only be produced in certain parts of the world and as consumers we are often unaware of their presence in many of the products we purchase and use. While the world has begun to wake up to the impact of such production and consumption patterns on nature, conservative interpretations of international trade rules have tempered the ambition with which countries might limit market access based on the ways in which goods are produced and the damage such practices can do to shared resources. However, rulings at the WTO, such as Shrimp-Turtle and Tuna-Dolphin, have established the ways in which countries can seek to use trade restrictions to protect wildlife and shared environmental resources, even when related to production occurring outside of their jurisdictions. Environmental protections and levels of enforcement differ the world over and there are political, legal and practical challenges the UK government will need to overcome. This is not only necessary and possible but already being achieved by governments around the world.
3. Challenges for domestic farmers
Complying and demonstrating compliance with high environmental standards comes at a necessary but higher cost for the UK farming sector. Given that some 70 per cent of UK land is under some form of agricultural management, farmers are on the frontline of efforts to recover nature and to drive down UK carbon emissions. Trade policy that further opens UK agri-food markets to cheaper – and potentially less sustainable – products risks the viability and competitiveness of the very sectors we are relying on to take action for biodiversity. Such a careless approach could generate pressure to reduce standards in the name of competitiveness, push otherwise profitable, nature-friendly farms out of business, or squeeze margins to such an extent that farmers are unwilling or unable to go the extra step for nature. This is why it is so critical that UK trade policy is closely and carefully aligned with domestic objectives, especially for food, farming and nature. By extension, trade policy seeking to drive prices down could have the effect of further ‘exporting’ the UK’s environmental footprint to areas even more globally important for biodiversity.
4. Trade in wildlife
Global trade not only impacts on wildlife but can consist of trade in wildlife. International agreements such as the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) have done much to govern the trade in wildlife and combat illegality. But animals (particularly in the form of wild-caught fish and seafood) and plants are still traded widely legally. From fish meal to botanicals, many are also ‘invisible’ ingredients in consumer goods and are notoriously difficult to regulate sustainably. Their impacts can come through the trade in the species themselves or the impact of their collection – through discards, damage to habitats or through competition for forage. However, sustainable trade and establishing markets for wild species can also be a means through which to conserve habitats. For example, in India’s Western Ghats, by creating a market for harvesting Bibhitaki and Haritaki fruits, the Fairwild scheme has helped incentivise local communities to preserve these important trees, rather than use them for firewood. These are used for nesting by the iconic Great Pied Hornbill and therefore demonstrates how sustainable trade can help support the conservation of valuable species.
5. Biological hazards & ‘invasive, non-native' species
Since the age of imperial expansion, species of plants and animals have been removed from different parts of the world and brought back – intentionally or unintentionally – to the UK. Many present little risk to local fauna and flora but so-called ‘invasive, non-native species' can bring negative ecological impacts for UK species and ecosystems, often through competition for habitat and food. Similarly, imported goods and modes of transportation can bring with them biological hazards such as pests and diseases that represent a threat to ‘native’ species – historic examples include the arrival of Dutch Elm disease on imported timber. Effective monitoring and regulation can help mitigate and control the risks and impacts of these arrivals, but such measures need proper investment and expertise. Failure to maintain adequate biosecurity controls and oversight when pursuing increased levels of trade or establishing networks of free ports would present a risk to UK biodiversity.
6. Infrastructure development
Trade is not just about goods and how they are produced but also how they are moved. Transport emissions and pollution are an important element of this but the infrastructure for moving goods can also have serious consequences for nature and biodiversity. Road and rail development in nature-rich landscapes can result in ecosystem fragmentation, while the total footprint of land converted for infrastructure can be massive. For example, the RSPB has been supporting BirdLife partners in Indonesia to prevent the construction of coal haulage roads through the precious lowland forests of Hutan Harapan in Indonesia. Closer to home, the development of ports can also bring about major impacts on areas of high sensitivity and biodiversity value – both through direct destruction of habitats and impacts on surrounding environments. We continue to work to ensure development in areas such as the Humber Estuary complies with international law and avoids losses for the environment.
Challenges and opportunities
Better addressing biodiversity
Awareness of how trade impacts on – and could address – biodiversity issues is somewhat lower than for other environmental policy areas. Carbon and water are generally more easily measured, food safety is more materially connected to products, and animal welfare can more easily be considered an issue of ‘public morals’ under WTO rules. But these challenges make it no less important to address these impacts – arguably they create a greater urgency to act, given the global crisis nature faces. Pro-nature trade policy must not serve as a form of ‘neo-colonialism’, whereby countries of the Global North impose their interests on the developing South and should not serve as protectionism or national discrimination by another name. Part of the challenge is that, unlike climate change affecting all countries, terrestrial biodiversity is, by its nature, somewhere and contained within national jurisdictions. However, while we must respect national competence and work through democratic structures, we should not imagine that nature is a parochial concern. The abundance, richness and diversity of living things on earth – and the processes that support them – are global goods and shared human concerns and we should not shy away from our collective responsibility to protect them.
A chance to lead
In a year of key conferences on biodiversity and climate change, the UK government has been outspoken about its ambition to be a global leader for the environment. Trade is a critical area where leadership and action are needed if we are to have a chance of turning around declines in nature globally. This action will come in different forms.
As WWF have proposed, there is scope for the UK government to lead on trade and the environment both internationally – through establishing a ‘Codex Planetarius’ for environmental standards (to match the equivalent international rule book on food safety, the Codex Alimentarius) – and domestically by developing a ‘core standards’ model. Something similar has also been proposed by the Trade and Agriculture Commission – to which the government needs to respond – and would mean establishing a common set of environmental rules against which imported and domestically produced agri-food goods would be judged.
Furthermore, the UK’s leadership role might well include reviving consensus and trust at the WTO, working bilaterally with key partners, maintaining high domestic and import standards, showing the way in how trade agreements can support biodiversity, ensuring UK export finance and overseas development aid is nature positive (and encouraging others to do the same), introducing corporate due diligence, better approaches to labelling, import restrictions, differentiated tariff measures, engaging and supporting voluntary schemes, and working collaboratively with national governments. All of this means making use of best science available, working with national governments and international forums, and building on the knowledge and expertise of local actors. Amid the many drivers of biodiversity loss and the many aspects of trade it is easy to overlook their importance to each other and the need for urgent action to ensure they align.