Dear Excellencies - Ministers, Ambassadors, UN colleagues, Honorable Members of the Steering Committee, Distinguished Officials,

I am delighted to greet all participants of the Steering Committee Meeting on behalf of the United Nations Development Programme and I would like to thank the organisers for offering the opportunity for UNDP to speak. And let me say how pleased I am to see you all here in Bishkek for this important event.

UNDP has enjoyed a long standing partnership with all entities in the Global Snow Leopard and Ecosystem Protection Program, and I would like to start by commending the Government of the Kyrgyz Republic for its steadfast and tireless championing of ecosystem and biodiversity protection at country level and at the intergovernmental level.

We recognize the crucial efforts of all the governments of range countries for keeping the objectives of the GSLEP high on the agenda and we commend the GSLEP Secretariat for keeping everyone motivated and engaged. We appreciate the crucial work of all members of the conservation community including the critical efforts of the civil society.

UNDP views snow leopard conservation as more than protecting the species: it manages our global heritage; manages landscapes; and fosters ecosystem health as the very foundation for inclusive and sustainable development. The snow leopard is a powerful indicator of the health of the mountainous ecosystems in terms of climate change and biodiversity, and its presence symbolizes ecosystem services such as fresh water and carbon sequestration that benefit human populations of billions living downstream.

Conservation of snow leopards is the conservation of biological and cultural diversity and securing livelihoods in the Third Pole. And preservation of natural mountain ecosystems is the way to sustainability, which also explains why this agenda, in a country whose territory consists to 94% of mountains is of such high national priority for Kyrgyzstan.  UNDP is pleased to provide technical support, along with the wider UN system agencies, to Kyrgyzstan’s efforts to raise the agenda of mountain ecosystems higher at the global level.

In its global strategy on Nature, UNDP identifies nature at the heart of human development by virtue of the linkages between biodiversity and ecosystems with human wellbeing and the resilience of communities for inclusive and sustainable growth.

Kyrgyzstan is working to expand the network of protected areas for the conservation of biodiversity in the aim of increasing the population of snow leopards. The sheer scale and scope of this task is further challenged by climate impacts and pressures from human economic activities, and the need to strengthen the capacity of protected areas institutional framework. In recent years, the Government of the Kyrgyz Republic has established three protected areas - "Khan-Tengri", "Alatai" and "Kan-Achuu". UNDP has the privilege of supporting these protected areas and enhance their biodiversity conservation capacities with financial support from the Global Environmental Facility.

We are very excited to learn that last year, as part of ongoing wildlife monitoring efforts, camera traps managed to capture unique images of snow leopards last year in the Western Tian Shan for the first time. Thanks to the collaborative efforts of the Ministry of Natural Resources, Ecology and Technical Supervision and conservation organizations and the donor community, the territories of the Central and Western Tian Shan are once again a place for a stable population of the snow leopard to grow. This is a prime example that coexistence of humans and snow leopards in harmony is possible.

UNDP has supported the development of climate-smart management plans, local communities development programs aligned with biodiversity conservation, anti-poaching community patrols, and information systems on protected areas. Including through a forthcoming GEF-supported programme in the Pamir Alay here in Kyrgyzstan, UNDP will continue support the strengthening of the policy and legal framework for conservation including the creation of new protected areas, develop capacity for landscape conservation management, support transboundary cooperation, and most crucially support sustainable local livelihoods in the high mountain ranges.

Together with all partners, UNDP is proud to support the snow leopard conservation efforts and meet the objectives and targets collectively set under the Global Snow Leopard Ecosystem Protection Program. UNDP currently supports the range countries in mobilizing financial resources and in pulling international, national and local expertise together to catalyze changes, necessary for safeguarding the snow leopard and its habitat, building directly on our existing and past support in 11 out of the 12 range countries and our presence in all the range countries. UNDP has a current ongoing portfolio of at least 40 projects with a total combined budget of more than US$ 130 million, implemented together with national governments.

Let me by a note on finance. Kyrgyzstan along with other countries is benefiting from UNDP’s global Biodiversity Finance Initiative focused on lasting solutions for Protected Areas financing, including through the development and adoption of a range of new and innovative instruments connecting nature to private sector partners in financial markets and leveraging existing resources for conservation. We can broaden the funding base for snow leopard conservation by helping countries mobilize and upscale private investment in nature-positive actions, develop national biodiversity finance plans, and accelerate integration of nature within national accounting systems.

At this juncture where the global economy is under threat by multiple cost of living crises, we must actively identify all solutions to sustain biodiversity conservation as a priority investment in public budgets, even in the face of shrinking fiscal space. In addition to the critical cause of halting biodiversity loss, there is an economic imperative because healthy ecosystem management plans can leverage additional investment.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I once again thank our hosts, the Government of the Kyrgyz Republic and the GSLEP Secretariat, for their leadership and I wish all participants a successful meeting. Thank you.