UNEP – Press Conference : "Sand and Sustainability"

Your colleagues, good morning and welcome to the launch of UNEP's Sand and Sustainability Report, an essential resource for nature and development. I think almost exactly four years ago we were in this building to launch the first edition of the report. And it's fair to say that sand has been growing in recognition as a vital resource, a critical issue. But extraction issues still remain. And so we're going to hear about a dilemma today about how sand is so essential to nature and at the same time demand for sand for infrastructure is surging and what we can do about it. So we have Pascal Paduzzi, our sandman, the head of GRID Geneva, and Stephanie Chua, program officer at GRID Geneva, with us today. Over to you, Pascal. Thank you, Mark. Very welcome to this press event. So we've been working for 14 months to get this new report. It's the third UNEP report on sand and sustainability. This one is focusing on this tension we have between the need of sand that we have for the infrastructures and the need that we have for keeping sand in nature for all the services it provides. And we will walk you through that. I usually start with questions on how much sand you've been using yesterday. I won't have time for guesses, but it's 18 kilograms that everybody is using every day. And the reason why is because we need sand for concrete, for roads, for buildings, for glass, for other infrastructures like dams and hospitals, bridges, tunnels and so on. Also for energy, solar panels and hydropower dams needs a lot of sand for concrete. And for buildings, when sand is trapped into concrete, it's actually transformed into concrete. It no longer exists. It doesn't, you can't go back to sand anymore. So it's dead. But we also need sand in its alive status where it's supporting biodiversity, it's protecting our landscape, it's protecting the filtration of the water, protects the coastline, regulates the river flows. So this is the dilemma because we actually want sand dead and alive. And usually the expression is or, but in this case we want it both. So we need sand to sustain our modern living and development and we need alive sand for ecosystem services, food, water and land security. Now sand is produced through slow erosion process over geological time scale. And yet we are where we need sand. We are extracting it way faster than it replenishes at the rate of 50 billion tons per year. That's the 18 kilograms per people multiplied by 8 billion people. So this is the sand gap. The production of sand takes geological time scale and the extraction is 50 billion tons per year. Just to give you a rough idea, 50 billion tons would be enough sand and gravels to make a wall of 27 meters high, 27 meters wide, all around the equator every year. And sand demand will be exacerbated by climate change. Because with sea level rise, we will need more sand to refurbish the beaches, to protect from salination of aquifers and against erosion of the coastline. It will also be exacerbated by population increase, migration from rural to urban area, development of infrastructure associated with economic growth. And we've seen that particularly in Asia and Southeast Asia where the economy was booming. But we will see it now in Africa because the population is going to double from now to 2050. That's plus 1.27 billion people. So all of them will need homes and schools and infrastructures and so on. When we look at the trend from the 70s to now, we see in yellow that the non-metallic mineral, basically sand, gravel, stones and gypsum. It used to be 31% in the 70s and it's now 48% in 2020. But the percentage is one thing, so it's already increasing its share. But also when you look at the absolute number, in the 70s we were extracting something like 30, 35 billion tons per year, whereas now we are exceeding 100 billion tons. So let's come back to the half of it is 50 billion tons of sand and gravel. And sand for building is expected to increase 45% by 2060. So we see a tremendous amount of demand that will increase. Already in 2020, the weight of all the built materials, so if you look at concrete, aggregates, bricks, metal, glass, plastics and everything, the weight of human buildings has exceeded the weight of the entire dry biomass of all the forest and vegetation of the world. So it means humans, these infrastructures, weigh more than nature. The sand demand will also be exacerbated with conflict happening in urban areas. This is a picture from Gaza, where the war in Gaza destroyed 85% of the infrastructures in Gaza, creating 57 million tons of debris, which need to be recycled. And there will be an enormous demand of new sand and gravel for making new concrete. You see this map, it is in the reports. You see where the destruction is, nearly total destruction of Gaza. And now they are recycling, but with their own means. They have recycled so far in the last four months 0.17%. And at this pace, it will take them 140 years. So there is an urgent need to help here to recycle this material and rebuild Gaza. With that, I will pass now the floor to Stephanie Schua, who will walk you through the report. All right. Thank you, Pascal. Thank you, Pascal. So in this report and also today, what we are really trying to deliver in terms of a key message is that sand provides, of course, a lot of values when it is extracted and used, underpinning our infrastructure and built environment. But when sand is left in place in nature, it also provides very essential, vital values, such as sustaining the very stability of our landscapes, providing key ecosystem services, and also sustaining biodiversity. So this is a graphic from the report. And as you can see, landscape-wise and as a society, the values are really very hard to even start to be quantified. And we are only starting to do that. And this is our attempt here at the report. And it's really a response to the coming Montreal global biodiversity framework, as you're going to see in the next slide, where we see sand overlapping with over 15 targets. Pascal, could you go to the next slide? Ah, there we go. And as such, very key to helping us achieve the goal to halt and reverse biodiversity loss by 2030. If we go to the next slide, you could see that sand is key to biodiversity. But when you leave sand in nature, as I've mentioned, the values are tremendous. However, extraction brings impacts. As you can see here is a scene of artisanal small-scale mining here at the beach, causing erosion. However, this is not limited to just informal mining, even highly formal, mechanized extraction has seen to be causing impacts in terrestrial, marine, and coastal, and riverine systems. And if we go to the next slide. Yes. And in this report, the goal is also to showcase that landscape-wise, we're only starting to understand the cumulative impacts to all these systems. And if you go to the next slide. Thank you. It also affects people. So, livelihoods such as fisheries and tourism, where billions of people depend on. It impacts resilience. Because sand does not only provide key ecosystem services where we've just mentioned, but at the supra level, we're looking at climate resilience. We're looking at food and water security and also land security, so impacts such as salination of coastal aquifers, water supply, and defense against storm surges. And we have also been seeing cases of child labor. So, in this report, we are presenting several strategic actions, especially on the front of putting sand as a strategic asset for its multiple values to nature and to people and to the environment. Of course, we're calling on governments at the national, subnational, and also at the multilateral level to establish national policies, structures, and processes to recognize sand's importance and also to create an inventory that understands the values of sand to nature and as a resource. So, we have several cases in the report that shows how we can better understand this as an asset, such as a sand budget. How can we go towards consensus building? So, in the case of this report, we present the case of Colombia, whose government has recognized sand and gravel as a strategic asset. We also present the case of the Gambia in the report, where we call for resilient and future-proof sand management in a rapidly changing world. Long-term planning is essential. And at UNEP Grid Geneva, we have developed a model where we can help countries to understand what is their sand demand for the next 10, 30, 50 years, and what are the opportunities for recycling and secondary material. We're also looking at governance across scales, because, as I've mentioned, the importance of sand and the impact of sand extraction. We see it from artisanal to industrial-scale extraction, from mega land reclamation projects to artisanal sand mining. That is happening in many developing regions. And there, we see different governance challenges that require coordinated actions, such as advancing formalization, collective responsibility, and shared benefits within the artisanal sand mining context. But also strengthening international frameworks in order to increase corporate accountability in the sand sector, especially in the transboundary context. And speaking about corporate accountability, sand and finance is one thing that we're insisting on in this report, just because a lot of the infrastructure projects involved key players, such as multilateral and bilateral development banks, export credit agencies, corporate finance. And these financial systems could act as an enabler, where we could mobilize more funding and more capital towards nature-based markets or recycling and alternative materials. But finance can also be a gatekeeper, where we shift away from harmful activities in line with the global biodiversity framework. Responsible sourcing, we're calling for a move away from the lowest bid tendering practices that we see often happening in big infrastructure projects. And finally, we're presenting some key actions that can be taken within the sand biodiversity nexus on how do we improve the measurement of biodiversity, how do we strengthen the spatial evidence base, and how do we prioritize prevention and standard space restoration. Of course, prevention should always come first, but when done well, standard space restoration can prove to be beneficial. And here we provide a case of the Maldives where we've shown how mapping of sensitive areas and extraction and the potential impacts or the impacts that are already happening is and can be very important in cases of very sensitive and key biodiversity areas. And I would like to also call for your attention on the marine sand watch, a platform developed by UNEP Grid Geneva, where we have been able to track large dredging vessels and their activities where we use AIS, automatic identification system, to track not only what they are doing, but how much of sediment they are extracting or moving or dumping. And with machine learning and AI, we have been able to track large dredging vessels and their activities where we use AIS, and we have seen that preliminary results and also continued monitoring has shown us that around 6 billion tons of marine sediment are dredged and moved yearly. And around 15% of these activities are actually happening within the marine protected areas. And to end, I would like to show you this sand tool. It is an assessment tool that we've developed alongside our report, and it brings together the actions from the 22 and the 26 sand and sustainability report, all of our actions and recommendations. And this is a way forward where we are calling for more planning, understanding of sand governance within national and subnational contexts, but also towards the goal of helping countries build a roadmap towards more sustainable and responsible sand management. And just some quick numbers about our report. This is the Sand and Sustainability and Essential Resource for Nature and Development is the third within the Sand and Sustainability series. And our reports have led to four resolutions at the United Nations Environmental Assembly. You have them listed down there. This report has been or is a result of 14 months of research and development. It involved many researchers and experts from industry, from governments around the world. And we have 24 actions and the sand tool that I just mentioned that comes with this report as well. And this is just to show that at the multilateral level, countries have repeatedly requested for scientific, technical and policy knowledge with regard to sand in order to support global policies and actions. You can find more information in this toolkit that comes with the press release today. So I'll just end by saying that sand is essential to nature and development. And we've started to see since the start of the Sand and Sustainability Report series, we have started to see that we're moving closer towards many issues in the environment, in our society, and also sand as a resource. But definitely now it's time where we have to recognize the values and also take necessary actions towards preserving the values of sand in nature and for our societies. Thank you. Thank you very much, Steve, for presenting this dilemma, but also the solutions and tools for going about managing sand. So colleagues in the room and online, the floor is open for your questions. And perhaps whilst you reflect on a question, I could start with one. I'm wondering how close are we getting to a crunch point? We've got sand can't be in two places at once. So are we seeing any infrastructure projects actually be cooled off with this dilemma? Thank you. Yes, thank you, Mark. It is depending, of course, on location. Some locations have a lot of sand left and other locations are really short of it. We recently, a bit more than a year ago, we saw that the international airport from Manila in Philippines had to stop because the sand supply was no longer available because they forbid to take the sand from the Manila Bay. And so now they didn't have any much sand for continuing the work on the international airport. More closer to us in Belgium and Denmark and Netherlands, those countries have no mountains. And Belgium and the Netherlands have done their assessment and they see that they've got, if they continue at the current rate, they've got sand for until 2080 for Belgium and a bit less for the Netherlands. So we see that this is something that used to be seen as a very common resources is actually not that common because, well, there's a lot of it, but we are using way more. Thank you. Thank you. Is that a hand up from UNTV? Sorry, I can see. Thank you. Daniel? Yeah, thank you, Mark. Very interesting. But I'm not allowed to answer, ask questions. So I'm just following. I'm interested observer. Thank you. Okay, well, thank you very much for following online. And to also see you and more colleagues at the briefing at 1030. And so you have the media kits with the press release and very good images as well, as well as the report, of course, in your inboxes. Thank you very much for being here today. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye.