On a teleconference from a meeting in Metz, France, where G7 environment ministers were discussing plastics pollution, climate change, and biodiversity, McKenna said the report Monday by the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) presented a “massive challenge”. National Observer says the report “put the inequality of environmental destruction into stark relief. It found that many of the areas of the world projected to be negatively hit by changes to biodiversity and ecosystems are also where ‘large concentrations of Indigenous peoples and many of the world’s poorest communities reside’.”

McKenna compared this week’s news to the October, 2018 IPCC report on 1.5°C pathways, which set a 12-year deadline for countries around the world to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 45%. “This was like the IPCC report on climate change. We now understand the magnitude of the challenge,” she said. “We need a Paris Agreement moment for nature, and I’m hoping we’re leading to that in 2020.”