Anticipating CBD COP17: The First Progress Review of the Biodiversity Framework

Isabella Mariani
Aug 20
4 min read

From 19th-30th October 2026, governments will meet in Yerevan, Armenia, for the Convention of Biological Diversity (CBD) COP17. It will be a key test of progress under the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF), as Parties assess delivery across its 23 targets, confront major implementation gaps, and agree how to accelerate action towards 2030.

Negotiations Will Review Results from CBD’s Global Progress Report

As of June 2026, the CBD released its first draft of the Global Report on Collective Progress in the Implementation of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework.

The Framework has generated substantial political engagement: 162 Parties have aligned national targets with it and countries address an average of 22 of its 23 targets. However, many national commitments cover only part of what the global targets require.

Fewer than half of Parties report being on track for any target, while negative biodiversity trends still outweigh positive ones. Progress therefore remains limited: the report’s scorecard shows relative differences between targets, not that any are on track. We include a visual summary drafted by AlterCOP from the report, below:

Most targets are assessed as showing limited relative progress. Targets concerning ecosystem restoration, sustainable agriculture, nature’s contributions to people, and biodiversity knowledge perform moderately better. By contrast, progress is particularly weak on reforming harmful subsidies, mobilising biodiversity finance, and advancing gender equality.

Ratings also reflect the quality of national targets, reporting, and available data, so stronger scores do not necessarily mean better biodiversity outcomes.

Measurement is Becoming an Implementation Issue

Monitoring is strongest for the first eight, more concrete conservation targets, where quantitative data is more available. Across the rest, reporting is uneven, with gaps in comparable time series, ecosystem and demographic detail, indicators, data infrastructure, and technical capacity.

Economy-wide targets are particularly difficult to track: Target 14, for example, requires biodiversity to be embedded across policy, planning, and finance. Inconsistent definitions and indicators also make projects harder to assess, limiting comparisons, and deterring investment. COP17 must improve monitoring without diverting resources from implementation.

Reassessing the Underlying Financial Structure

The Global Environment Facility (GEF), originally designed as a climate-focused funding mechanism, was also tasked with financing CBD implementation. But its structure is less suited to biodiversity projects, which are more diverse, locally specific, and harder to standardise. As a result, even committed capital has been slow to reach a limited project pipeline.

Target 8’s relatively stronger performance may partly reflect its closer links to climate outcomes, where existing GEF structures are more established, although progress remains difficult to assess. For other targets, more biodiversity-specific financing approaches may be needed.

Finance, therefore, features more prominently on COP17’s agenda, with attention shifting from how much is committed to whether funding is accessible, timely, locally deployable, and capable of mobilising private capital.

The focus has shifted towards enabling the Global Biodiversity Framework Fund (GBFF), created within the GEF in 2023 specifically to support GBF implementation. It is already approving national projects making effective deployment critical to meeting the GBF’s funding targets.

The Framework’s Target 19 calls for at least US$200 billion a year to be mobilised for biodiversity by 2030 from domestic, international, public, and private sources. The global progress report indicates that its interim objective of US$20 billion a year by 2025 was probably not achieved and finds comparatively limited progress in mobilising and tracking private finance.

COP16 responded with a broader resource-mobilisation strategy and a roadmap for longer-term financial arrangements, whose progress COP17 will review.

From Global Commitments to Locally Led Delivery

COP16 also strengthened the formal role of Indigenous Peoples and local communities by adopting a new programme of work under Article 8(j) and establishing a permanent subsidiary body dedicated to their participation and traditional knowledge. This also allows them to attend COPs as delegates, enabling them to inform implementation of the Framework.

That participation could become increasingly important at COP17, where the main theme is Localisation. Global targets must ultimately be translated into national biodiversity strategies, regulations, and individual projects. Governments will need to balance common standards with local ecological conditions, community rights, and different national capacities.

COP17’s success will depend less on new ambition than on making the existing Framework deliverable. Clearer monitoring, stronger national plans, coordinated action, accessible finance, and meaningful participation will be essential. The first global review will show where action has begun; negotiations in Yerevan must determine how to accelerate it enough to keep the 2030 targets within reach.

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Footnotes

Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF): The global agreement adopted in 2022 that sets 23 targets for countries to halt and reverse biodiversity loss by 2030.
Global Environment Facility (GEF): An international fund that helps developing countries finance projects protecting the global environment, including biodiversity and climate action.

AI Assistance Disclosure

This post was compiled with the assistance of AI. AI was used for limited research, grammar checks, structural brainstorming, and creation of the cover image of the article by merging two internet photos into one. The link to both original images are included in the resources below. All analysis, fact-checking, source selection, drafting, editing and final conclusions were managed entirely by the human author.