COP16: warm words, but where's the action?

This week, representatives of 196 countries are meeting in Cali, Colombia for the United Nations’ biodiversity conference COP16, which runs until Friday 1^st November.

It’s the UN’s first global meeting focusing on biodiversity since December 2022, when nations agreed to adopt the historic Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework at COP15 in Montreal, Canada.

That landmark agreement two years ago – which has been called the ‘Paris Agreement’ for nature – set out four global goals and 23 targets to help halt and reverse biodiversity loss by 2030. The largest of these was the ’30 by 30’ goal, which saw nations commit to designating 30% of the world’s land and marine regions as protected areas by 2030.

Given the commitments made last time out in Canada, COP16’s focus will be on implementing them. The key question that will hang over the summit until it ends on 1^st November is how nations will set about achieving their goals, given their resounding failure to do in the past.

That’s why at COP16, countries will be expected to put forward National Biodiversity Strategies and Action Plans (NBSAPs), setting out how they’ll hit their targets. How many NBSAPs we see by the end of this summit will be a good indication of how successful it’s been. Unfortunately, over 80% of nations are rumoured to have arrived in Colombia having missed the deadline for submitting their plans, which doesn’t bode well for serious action.

The next two weeks will of course see plenty of attention being given to protecting fragile ecosystems like coral reefs and rainforests and including indigenous communities in the decision-making process. However, there are some initial indications that food and agriculture could also play a key role in COP16’s discussions.

A quick glance at the agenda for the summit shows events on topics such as soil management, supporting sustainable livelihoods in rural areas, and celebrating Colombia’s recent ratification of the ‘Plant Treaty’, a 2001 agreement which aims to guarantee the sustainable use and exchange of plant genetic resources. This is key to supporting food security, with around 120 cultivated species providing around 90% of the world’s food requirements. Today (Thursday 24^th October) will see sessions on securing progress for fisheries, and how nature-positive agriculture can make our food systems more sustainable.

While there’ll be lots of warm words about supporting the rights of small-scale farmers and putting them at the heart of nations implementing their NBSAPs, there’s little sign of the real big hitters in the food industry being seriously challenged – a worry given that around 80% of the Amazon rainforest’s destruction is being caused by cattle rearing.

Opening COP16 this week, Colombia’s left-wing president Gustavo Petro challenged the world by blaming capital and profit for our loss in biodiversity, stressing: “We must change global finance.” The biodiversity and climate crises are of course inextricably linked; we can only truly protect animals and their habitats if we address the damaging practices linked to their destruction.

If the meat and dairy industries aren’t made to sweat at least a little by events at COP16, we won’t tackle either crisis any time soon. Let’s hope that by the start of November, nations will have found the courage to match their convictions.