Partners What is Sustainable Procurement? Sustainable Construction Conference Guidebook Contacts Pocket File Case Studies Home

The Guidebook

Resources:

Sustainable development and ethical frameworks

Biodiversity criteria for evaluating development

[The list below is taken from the statement of “Biodiversity criteria for evaluating development assistance projects” produced by the World Resources Institute and available on the Convention of Biodiversity web site. (Downloaded from the convention on biodiversity web-site 29 March 2004- http://www.biodiv.org/doc/guidelines/fin-wri-gd-lns-en.pdf)

These criteria are drafted for applying to a consideration of projects that might be eligible for development assistance. But they provide a very useful frame of reference for purchasers to use in considering whether or not to deal with a particular supplier.

“Projects should not be financed through development assistance if they violate the following criteria.

Process criteria

• are planned for regions where basic surveys of plant and vertebrate taxa have been conducted, and for regions with an ecosystem classification system in place;
• involve local people, especially women, in the initial biodiversity inventory and project planning, as well as in review and implementation;
• provide ready access to biological survey information and planning documentation (in local languages) to local people;
• include Environmental Impact Assessments that explicitly address the impacts of projects on genetic, species, and ecosystem diversity;
• provide for a means of monitoring impacts on biodiversity and modifying project implementation based on that feedback;

Biological criteria

• do not destroy, degrade, or fragment habitat used by a species listed as globally threatened or endangered by the IUCN or listed on Appendix I of CITES and do not involve the harvest of such a species;
• do not involve any exploitation of resources or disturbance of habitat in strictly protected areas (IUCN Categories I to III), including the core zone of Biosphere Reserves and World Heritage Sites;
• do not take place in an ecosystem or biogeographic unit designated as a threatened site by IUCN or by the proposed International Panel on Biodiversity Conservation;
• do not result in the conversion or degradation of primary forests;
• do not engender the loss of genetic diversity of domesticated species without adequately supporting grassroots conservation groups financially and institutionally, or establishing national genebanks to ensure the ex situ preservation of that diversity;
• do not destroy or degrade the habitat of migratory species listed as globally threatened by IUCN or by any country in their migratory route;
• do not introduce species or varieties in violation of the IUCN guidelines for translocations of living organisms;
• are consistent with the country's National Conservation Strategy or other similar conservation planning document or with any international convention to which the state is party;
• Social criteria
• do not increase landlessness or resource needs without provision of alternative suitable to the local people;
• provide a substantial share of any increased economic benefits from biodiversity (through, for instance, tourism or exploration for pharmaceutical plants) to local communities;
• do not degrade or encroach upon the ancestral domain of indigenous groups without their informed consent;
• ensure that any research on biodiversity or biological resources makes full use of local and national expertise, significantly strengthens local and national research capacity, and helps the host country acquire the technologies involved in the research;
• recognize and reward rights to traditional knowledge on biological resources and biodiversity;
• provide the option to maintain traditional lifestyles or traditional uses of biological resources; and,
• do not destroy or degrade the resources upon which women depend to maintain their families, nor increase their burdens inadvertently."