At the UN Biodiversity Conference COP17 in Yerevan, the Leaders’ Summit is a first of its kind for the UN Convention on Biological Diversity. It aimed to raise political momentum and ambition from the highest levels of government towards biodiversity actions, with almost ten Heads of State and high-level officials in attendance, including the UN Secretary-General.
Commenting from the ground in Yerevan at COP17 on day four of negotiations, Guido Broekhoeven, Interim Global Director of Multilateral Policy at WWF, said:
“It is still early days, but the corridors are filled with determined delegates who are working hard to find common ground and compromise on key issues being negotiated. Of course, patience is still being tested around elements like the Global Review, which guides Parties on what actions they need to take after COP17. How firm and decisive the language used here will be important in setting the tone and urgency. Ultimately, the debate is about providing the ‘means of implementation’ – the funding, capacity-building, technology and other resources that will enable the ‘raising of ambition’ and scaling up of national biodiversity action plan implementation.”
“On resource mobilisation, it’s clear there are still a lot of divergent views and, as always, it is the most contentious element, but things are moving. Right now, the main complementary fund to the Global Environment Facility to support the implementation of the Global Biodiversity Framework, the Global Biodiversity Framework Fund (GBFF) established at COP15, lacks significant funding. We must see a scaling up of biodiversity finance from public, private, and philanthropic sources so that commitments made in Montreal almost four years ago, can finally be delivered.
“In addition, the Cali Fund – which aims to encourage funding from companies using digital sequenced information (DSI) on genetic resources, with 50% of contributions going to Indigenous Peoples, to date, only stands at $10,656 USD committed from five companies. While Parties spend many hours discussing how the Cali Fund should function effectively, the end goal will be irrelevant without significant more sums of money in the pot from companies to enable equitable benefit sharing.”
