The Portuguese Presidency of the European Union in 2007 launched the Business and Biodiversity Initiative,
with the main goal of highlighting the relationship between business and biodiversity, enabling business give a
significant contribution to biodiversity protection and to pursue the goal of halting the loss biodiversity at local,
national, regional and global levels. Subsequently the European Commission established an European
Platform on Business and Biodiversity, defining priority sectors for action, among which stands the food supply
sector, involving retailers, packaging and food processing business; this platform is developing further guidance
lines, using case-studies to develop a better performance on biodiversity and ecosystems.
The UN Convention on Biological Diversity, in its 10th Conference of the Parties at Nagoya, Japan in October
2010, encouraged the involvement of the business sector in biodiversity protection and recognized the role of
NGOs in influencing business practices and as facilitators of change in consumer behavior and expectations of
society. Furthermore, the European Council of Environment Ministers, at its meeting on December the 20th
2010 welcomed the decisions of this world summit, highlighting “the importance of cooperation with the
business sector” and “integrating economic valuation of biodiversity value and ecosystems in decisions of
public and private sector.”
In this context Quercus is developing the project Enterprises and Biodiversity, a contribution to disseminating
and providing methodological resources, recent experiences and case-studies, applicable and tangible for
businesses in Portugal. Quercus organizes this meeting, hoping it can mobilize more companies towards the
preservation and investment on natural capital – the very basis for food supply – contained in the goods and
services provided by ecosystems and biodiversity. The event is organized in collaboration with the European
Business and Biodiversity Campaign – funded under the LIFE Program of the EU.
