Pandemics and Environmental Degradation

Debate between Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer and Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park

Wednesday 24th February 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the relationship between the emergence of pandemics and environmental degradation.

[The Minister of State, Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park) (Con) [V]]

My Lords, my department has not made an independent assessment of the relationship between the emergence of pandemics and environmental degradation. However, Defra has been fully engaged in the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystems Services work, including the 2019 Global Assessment Report on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services, which highlighted the links between exploitation of nature and emergence of infectious diseases, and the subsequent IPBES workshop report on biodiversity and pandemics, which was published last year.

[Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his reply. This pandemic is a stark example of exactly what those pieces of research have found: what happens when nature is abused, whether through habitat destruction or the wildlife trade, can wreak stark things for humans. I know that the Minister, through his work with the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures, is aware that evaluation and disclosure by corporates and the investment sector is very important, but does he agree that subsequent action is even more important? What lessons would he draw from all the work on carbon issues, so that we move from high carbon emissions to much lower carbon emissions and an ambition for net—