Cuba: Int’l Conference Debates Climate Change Mitigation

Cuba: Int'l Conference Debates Climate Change MitigationHavana, Jul 7. -Climate change mitigation, greenhouse gas inventory, ecosystems and sustainable management of resources are some of the issues to be addressed Thursday at the 8th International Convention on Environment and Development.

Opened on Monday, the convention includes conferences on protected areas, climate change, ecosystems and biodiversity, and education and environmental management.

Also included are three colloquiums on environmental law, environmental management, and hazard, vulnerability and risk assessment, as well as an exhibition fair in which institutions and agencies will present technology, projects and experiences.

More than 900 delegates from 30 nations are attending the event, including Ahmed Djoghlaf, executive secretary of the Convention on Biological Diversity, and Luc Gnacadja, executive secretary of the UN Convention to Combat Desertification.

Nikita Lopoukhing, chairman of the World Commission on Protected Areas, is also attending the convention.

Lopoukhing highlighted Cuba's work in protected areas going back to 1930, when Pico Cristal National Park was declared the first of those zones.

Cuba has 16.8 percent of protected land surface, and nearly 25 percent of marine areas under the same concept.

"You have done well," Lopoukhing stated during the Convention's opening session at the Havana International Conference Center.

With the conservation of ecosystems, air and water quality are improved, floods are anticipated, erosion is controlled, carbon is stored, and cultural services are strengthened, such as entertainment, eco-tourism, cultural heritage, and better physical and mental health, he said. (Prensa Latina)