I would like to ask you to incorporate the (Re)connection Model as a model for sustainable and inclusive change that you already use in Jeju as one of the guiding principles that could also be interesting for other countries as well. This period is decisive for the planet. UN Secretary-General António Guterres stated that the last report - ‘The Physical Science basis’ - published by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is a code red for humanity. “The alarm bells are deafening, and the evidence is irrefutable: greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel burning and deforestation are choking our planet and putting billions of people at immediate risk,” the Secretary-General says in a statement. At the UN CBD COP 15 and COP 26 in Glasgow parties try to agree to build a biodiversity-friendly, climate-neutral and resilient planet. To keep global warming far below 2°C (idealy maximum warming of 1.5°) we need to be climate-neutral in 2050 and half the emissions of greenhouse gasses in the next decade. To stop the decline of natural ecosystems and to stop the Holocene extinction/Sixth extinction of species we need to halt the loss of biodiversity in the next decade and start immediately to restore our natural ecosystems. The (Re)connection Model can be helpful to reach these objectives. First, we need to give more space, light, food and care to nature. Second, we need to translate ‘biodiversity’ into a language that people can understand and relate to. It is only when they’ll find reasons to love the world that they’ll save it. Third, we need to adopt the (Re) connection model in which we reconnect nature with nature, people with nature, business with nature, as well as a policy with practice. It is by thinking globally, acting locally and changing personally that we’ll create the world we want, starting today, caring for nature and future generations.

• Ignace Schops(Directeur/Director, President EUROPARC Federation, Goldman Prize Winner, Ashoka Fellow Climate Leadership Corps - Al Gore, Belium)