Cuts to aid are a national security risk
4 min read
If the UK slashed its defence spending, despite the growing threat Russia poses to our national security, the public would rightly be appalled, and ministers would be pressed to explain their decision.
Yet there is another danger to our way of life – one our intelligence services warn could result in food shortages, increased terrorism and further pandemics – where funding is quietly disappearing. It is time that decision was given the same scrutiny.
Earlier this year, a bombshell intelligence assessment laid bare how the destruction of nature and the feared collapse of essential ecosystems including rainforests, coral reefs and mangroves “threaten UK national security and prosperity”.
One stark sentence reads: “It is unlikely the UK would be able to maintain food security if ecosystem collapse drives geopolitical competition for food,” noting we depend on imports to feed our people.
Retired General Richard Nugee, giving evidence to the Environmental Audit Committee that I chair, called it “seminal” to see the potential consequences of the nature and climate crises in a national security risk assessment – and said he would expect a government strategy to deal with the threats.
I welcome the fact that the government produced this report, and acknowledged these dangers, but it now demands action.
However, the former minister for nature Mary Creagh admitted the government is not preparing for these threats “at the speed or intensity that I would wish” – and was unable to say when that would change. In fact, the UK is going backwards at the very moment it should step forward, because the 40 per cent cut to our international development budget is withdrawing money to protect and restore nature when it is needed most.
Funding to save the crucial Congo Basin rainforest, the world’s second largest, has been cut by 79 per cent. That is an astonishing decision at any time, but ministers must explain how it can be justified when the intelligence report highlights the Congo as “critical for UK national security” and at risk of collapse.
The future of the £500m Blue Planet Fund, inspired by Sir David Attenborough’s Blue Planet series to protect the world’s oceans as vital to the planet’s future stability, is also in doubt.
For years, the UK has recognised the danger of biodiversity loss by ringfencing around one-third of its international climate finance for nature – but that ringfence has gone, as climate aid has been cut by at least 30 per cent.
I am delighted by the announcement that the UK will invest £400m in the Tropical Forests Forever Facility (TFFF), which will conserve rainforests across the globe. However, the UK’s investment still pales in comparison to the billions of pounds of cuts to international climate and nature finance.
My committee urged the government to explain how the daunting challenges posed by the national security assessment can be met without this funding, but did not receive a satisfactory answer.
Within weeks, nations will gather at the COP17 biodiversity conference in Armenia, a critical staging post towards the UN target to mobilise $200bn a year in public and private funding for nature by 2030 – when ministers will be asked, “What are you doing to help achieve that?” How will they answer that question convincingly?
I welcome the taskforce the government has set up, allowing security and military experts to advise what actions the UK must take – but that advice is unlikely to include dramatic cuts to programmes to prevent ecosystem collapse.
In evidence to my committee, an expert from the Chatham House policy institute argued climate breakdown is destroying the foundations for the world’s security in a way unseen since the dawn of the nuclear era 80 years ago.
It is a wake-up call the new government under Andy Burnham must confront with the same urgency and resolve it would muster if this was a military threat.
The King showed he understands what is at stake in his address to the United States Congress earlier this year, when he urged nations to “address the collapse of critical systems” that “provide the foundation for our prosperity and our national security”. Our new Prime Minister must heed the King’s call.
