Climate change 'one part of environmental puzzle'

Graham Lloyd in the Australian: Climate change should not overshadow important environmental issues such as managing ecosystems, protecting biodiversity and sustainable development, World Wildlife Fund global president Yolanda Kakabadse said yesterday.

Ms Kakabadse, a former environment minister in Ecuador, does think climate change is important. In fact, she likes to call it "climate emergency" because people today are conditioned to believe that "change is good". Speaking ahead of conference appearances in Sydney and Canberra this week, Ms Kakabadse said climate change was only one part of the environment puzzle.

"The climate change agenda has overtaken every discussion and debate on the environment without realising that depletion of natural resources and ecosystems and biodiversity is one of the main causes," she said.

"Unless we talk about biodiversity and ecosystems and species and protected areas as well as sustainable management of natural resources, we cannot come to conclusions about climate change."

Ms Kakabadse said WWF believed the key to success environmentally lay in building strong relationships with business. "We need to have stronger links to the business sector and the industrial sector because they are the movers and shakers of the economy; unless they are key partners in solving the problems, then we won't be able to move ahead," she said....