Environment policy issues
Areas of RSB work relevant to the environment, including committee work, letters to Government, policy responses and more.
Letters to Government
The RSB have recently sent letters to the Prime Minister about the climate emergency ahead of COP26, and to HM Treasury ahead of the 2021 Budget, have featured environmental concerns prominently.
RSB's Education and Science Policy Committee activity
The Committee recommended prioritising work to promote linked action on climate and biodiversity; increase our focus on UK biosecurity; and raise the profile of biodiversity in policymaking across government following the publication of the Dasgupta Review.
Policy Responses
RSB responses to recent (2018-2021) government and national body consultations and parliamentary inquiries included significant content on the environment.
Links to the RSB submissions are provided in the table below.
|
Subject |
Consulting body |
Date |
|
Defra |
Jun 2021 |
|
|
HM Treasury |
Sep 2020 |
|
|
S&T Committee (Commons) |
Jul 2020 |
|
|
OCR |
Jul 2020 |
|
|
HM Treasury |
Nov 2019 |
|
|
Defra |
Oct 2019 |
|
|
Defra |
Aug 2018 |
|
|
Defra |
Sep 2019 |
|
|
Defra |
Aug 2018 |
Publications
Reports and articles between 2018 and 2021 relating to the environment are listed below.
|
Title |
Description |
Date |
|
Report of the NCI’s 10th anniversary summit |
Aug 2019 |
|
|
Report on opportunities arising in plant science from the RSB Plant Science Group (then UKPSF) |
Jan 2019 |
|
|
Defining and delivering resilient ecological networks: Nature conservation in England |
Article in the Journal of Applied Ecology developed from an NCI workshop |
Jun 2018 |
|
Report from the NCI Dialogue Session ‘Operationalising the Natural Capital Protocol in land-based businesses’ |
Aug 2018 |
Meetings
The RSB hosted many public events and specialist workshops with environmental themes recently.
|
Title |
Description |
Date |
|
Panel discussion exploring the complexities of improving food security and health while also reversing biodiversity loss and achieving net zero greenhouse gas emissions targets. (video available). |
Oct 2021 |
|
|
Proof for Life - Where next for the evidence linking nature and health? |
Panel discussion on the question 'where next for the evidence linking nature and health? (video available) |
Jul 2021 |
|
Parliamentary Links Day 2021 online event |
Jun 2021 |
|
|
A talk by Dr Ruth Waters from the Dasgupta Review team (video available) |
Feb 2021 |
|
|
Online panel discussion on priorities and key questions for science, policy and business (video available) |
Jan 2021 |
|
|
Online Policy Lates panel discussion event |
Nov 2020 |
|
|
Online event for Biology Week 2020 featuring Science minister Amanda Solloway MP and Hilary Benn MP |
Nov 2020 |
|
|
Dasgupta Review on the Economics of Biodiversity: NCI workshops |
Two online workshops to discuss the Dasgupta Review on the Economics of Biodiversity with the HM Treasury’s review team |
Apr 2020 |
|
Biology Week event held at the Royal Institution |
Oct 2019 |
|
|
Biology Week Policy Lates event |
Oct 2019 |
|
|
Major summit marking the NCI’s 10th anniversary |
May 2019 |
|
|
Parliamentary event to launch report |
Jan 2019 |
|
|
Roundtable discussion bringing together experts and Defra policy lead |
Aug 2018 |
Biologist articles
|
Thirteen ways that bioscience is helping fight climate change: How life science is helping us reduce emissions, lock away carbon and adapt to a warming world. |
|
Bioscience must treat climate change for the global emergency that it is: The COVID-19 pandemic has shown what biology can do in a crisis. Can we focus efforts and resources in the same way for climate change? |
|
Climate: code red: As the need for action on climate change and species loss becomes more urgent, an increasing number of scientists are turning to environmental activism. Emma Wrake AMRSB speaks to some of them |
|
The right tree in the right place: Formal targets and frameworks to tackle biological diversity and climate change must be better integrated – or initiatives to tackle one problem could make the other worse, writes Rebecca Robertson |
|
Saving the library of life: Tom Ireland talks to Dame Georgina Mace about the scale of the global crisis of biodiversity loss, and how she stays positive in the face of relentlessly worrying trends |
|
"We're creating landscapes suited to the animals that transmit disease to us": Professor Kate Jones says a woeful lack of communication between public health bodies and ecologists is failing to prevent spillover of animal diseases into human populations |