Compromises, challenges and more unfinished business at COP16’s reconvened biodiversity talks

This piece, written by Karen Wong-Pérez and Anna Ducros, was originally published on the IIED website.

At the end of February, the 16th Conference of Parties on the Convention on Biological Diversity (COP16) reconvened in Rome to address some unfinished business. The aim was to complete negotiations on key issues that had been left unresolved after the first COP16 took place in Cali, Colombia, in October 2024.

COP16 in Cali will be remembered with mixed emotions: it resulted in some landmark wins and notable disappointments. With those negotiations ultimately ending without a resolve, COP16 2.0 in Rome presented a critical chance to pick up where Cali left off and finally agree the way forward in achieving the global biodiversity framework.

The focus at COP16 2.0 centred on six key agenda points left undecided in Cali: mobilising financial resources; the financial mechanisms to govern funding flows; the monitoring framework; the mechanism for planning, monitoring, reporting and reviewing; cooperation with other conventions and international organisations; and the multi-year programme of work of the COP.

In a positive outcome, parties adopted various agreements on biodiversity at the end of the three day-summit. However, these agreements involved some necessary compromises, meaning that levels of ambition remained disappointing.

Expectations vs reality

Global South countries, including the African group that negotiates as a bloc, came to Rome to negotiate for a new, dedicated, biodiversity fund that would be under the governance of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) secretariat. They argued that the current structure, in which the Global Biodiversity Framework Fund (GBBF) is managed by the Global Environment Facility (GEF), renders funding both bureaucratic and inaccessible. Global North countries however, including the European Union, strongly oppose a new fund – arguing that the existing financial landscape is already fragmented and advocating for the reform of the GEF instead.

In reality, what was achieved was a compromise. The final agreementt (PDF) on the financial mechanism – recognised as the one of the two most contentious agenda points – did not decide between a new fund or GEF reform. Rather, countries agreed to assess and reform the GEF over the next three CBD COP sessions (from now until COP19, in 2030), and through this assessment determine if a dedicated biodiversity fund is required.

Steps to assess the GEF, and possible criteria for a new dedicated fund, were outlined in the resource mobilisation document. The potential new fund is meant to be additional. Should it be created, it would possibly include characteristics (PDF) such as: being under the authority of COP; an ability to provide direct funding allocation, including for collective action and non-market-based approaches; and an aim to mobilise resources from all sources. 

For continuity’s sake, many want this potential new fund to have a relationship with the current GBFF, which is set to run its course in 2030.

Mobilizing resources: a contentious issue

The other contentious issue on the agenda was resource mobilization. On this, the final agreement reaffirmed the need to mobilise at least US$200 billion of finance from all sources per year by 2030: with a commitment to mobilise $20 billion per year of international finance by the end of 2025 and $30 billion per year by 2030.

The Resource Mobilisation Agreement emphasises a gender-responsive, human rights-based approach to financial mobilisation; it called on parties to improve access to – and increase financial resources for – Indigenous Peoples and local communities (IPs and LCs), women and youth, for the implementation of the framework. 

Additionally, there is a target to ensure 20% of the GBFF reaches IPs and LCs by 2030. However, there are no clear mechanisms for ensuring direct financial access for women-led biodiversity efforts, despite gender references in the text.

This comes as the US, the Netherlands and Germany have all announced reductions to overseas development assistance in recent times. Meanwhile the UK last week announcedthat it would cut its overseas aid budget – just as COP16 2.0 was taking place. 

Against this backdrop, the possibility of closing the biodiversity funding gap and meeting the $20 billion target in the next nine months (from international sources) seems far from reality. 

Measuring progress and meaningful participation

In terms of measuring progress, at the reconvened COP16 the finalised texts of the monitoring framework and the mechanisms for planning, monitoring, reporting and review acknowledge the need to ensure the effective participation of IPs and LCs, women and youth, in decision-making. The texts highlight the importance of disaggregated data that reflects these groups’ realities, and the importance of community-based monitoring systems and participatory data collection mechanisms – in line with the whole-of-society approach advocated by the CBD.

However, there are no binding obligations to guarantee their meaningful participation; gender-responsive indicators remain voluntary. This means that gender-disaggregated data collection is optional rather than mandatory.

Additionally, there were no guaranteed financial resources and capacity-building measures for IP and LCs or women and youth to engage in community-based monitoring processes. This issue demands further attention.

Meanwhile, the global review process remains heavily dependent on national reports that governments submit to the CBD: however, countries will need to approve all contributions from non-state actors. 

This rule reduces the influence and recognition of contributions from non-state actors (including IPs and LCs, women and youth) on official biodiversity assessments, by creating a bureaucratic barrier that reduces their ability to independently share their contributions.

As frontline stewards of biodiversity, IPs and LCs, and women and youth, often implement successful conservation practices. However, their efforts might not be recognised or counted toward national targets if governments fail to acknowledge them or instead prioritise state-led or corporate-driven initiatives, leaving the efforts of IPs and LCs, women and youth unvalued or ignored. This has the potential to reinforce existing power imbalances, especially if their contributions challenge state or corporate interests.

Ahead of the Rome summit, the CBD Women’s Caucus called for a human-rights based and gender-responsive approach to ensure that IPs and LCs, women and youth had direct access to funding and a role in governance decisions. 

However, the fast pace of the negotiations resulted in the limited participation from civil society and observer groups: a challenge acknowledged by the COP president in the closing session. 

The Women’s Caucus voiced its frustration over its limited space for engagement. This was particularly since COP16 was branded as the ‘People’s COP’ designed to take a whole-of-society approach, which requires the meaningful participation of all sectors of society.  Sadly, this proved not to be the case.

The road to COP17 in Armenia, 2026  

The next three COP sessions (until COP19 in 2030, when the GBF will end) will be critical for committing, mobilising and evaluating global biodiversity finance and its governance. However, while securing adequate biodiversity finance is crucial, finance alone will not solve the biodiversity crisis. 

Regrettably, the negotiations continue to reflect the biodiversity governance at large: a context in which unequal power dynamics exist between global North and global South governments, and where non-state actors – particularly IPs and LCs, women and youth – are excluded from biodiversity decision-making. 

With preparations already underway for COP17 in Armenia late next year, it’s essential that as a global community, we ensure that the GBF – together with its monitoring, evaluation and resulting actions – is inclusive, equitable and participatory. 

The whole-of-society and whole-of-government approach to the biodiversity summits cannot simply be reduced to a rhetorical commitment. It’s time for action, not just talk.