As the United Nations Biodiversity Conference (COP16) unfolds in Cali, Colombia over the next two weeks, most nations have missed the deadline to submit updated conservation pledges, highlighting a global shortfall in efforts to meet 2030 biodiversity targets.
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Although talks are already underway, less than a fifth of member states have filed their renewed commitments and conservation action strategies.
All 196 countries party to the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) signed the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) – dubbed the “Paris Agreement for Nature” – at COP15 in 2022.
With a central ambition of protecting at least 30 per cent of the globe’s land and oceans by 2030, the framework requires countries to develop national strategies and programmes for the conservation and sustainable use of natural resources.
The United Nations Biodiversity Conference’s counterpart to the Paris Agreement’s nationally determined contributions (NDCs), these pledges are submitted to the CBD in the form of National Biodiversity Strategies and Action Plans (NBSAPs).
Of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) member states, only Indonesia and Malaysia submitted their updated conservation commitments before talks kicked off on Monday in Cali.
The CBD’s media portal shows that so far only 35 out of 196 of its party nations have submitted their post-Kunming-Montreal GBF commitments.
Lakshmi Lavanya Rama Iyer, WWF-Malaysia’s director of policy and climate change, noted that “competing national priorities” may be why most Southeast Asian countries found it difficult to meet COP16’s NBSAP submission timeline.
“Economic development pressures can sometimes overshadow environmental commitments, making it difficult for governments to prioritise biodiversity,” Lavanya told Eco-Business, adding that developing and implementing robust conservation plans requires significant financial, technical and human resources.
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It is important to emphasise that the quality of these [NBSAP] plans is paramount. Clear, actionable steps and a transparent implementation framework are essential to ensure effective biodiversity conservation and sustainable development.
Lakshmi Lavanya Rama Iyer, director of policy and climate change, WWF-Malaysia
Similarly, Zoological Society of London (ZSL) Philippines country director Edwina Garchitorena stressed that strained resources might explain the commitment shortfall. ZSL is a science-drive conservation charity that manages nature restoration projects in 50 countries globally including the Philippines and Thailand.
“Three main challenges contribute to countries failing to submit or update their NBSAPs: a lack of capacity and resourcing within responsible governments, a lack of understanding among departments of the importance of biodiversity for a thriving economy and inadequate tools and methods to monitor and value the services that healthy ecosystems provide,” the campaigner explained.
WWF’s Lavanya said Malaysia has set a “positive example” by taking proactive steps to revise its pledges. Among other targets, Malaysia’s national policy on biodiversity aims to conserve at least 20 per cent of its terrestrial resources and inland waters – as well as 10 per cent of its coastal and marine resources – as protected areas by 2030.
The Philippines – despite being considered one of the world’s most biodiverse countries alongside Indonesia and Malaysia – missed the COP16 deadline to file its renewed conservation pledges. With the archipelago’s budget allocation for landscape and biodiversity protection set to be slashed for the third consecutive year this 2025, the country’s current level of public spending on biodiversity leaves a 80 per cent financing gap, according to United Nations figures.
Financing shortfall
Following COP15, the CBD launched the Global Biodiversity Framework Fund, aimed at mobilising at least US$200 billion annually for biodiversity conservation by 2030. As part of this framework, developed nations committed to provide the Global South with at least US$20 billion per year by 2025, increasing to US$30 billion annually by 2030.
With wealthy nations falling short of these financing pledges, Rainforest Trust chief executive officer James Deutsch underscored that some countries party to the CBD may feel discouraged. Rainforest Trust is a US-based organisation that supports rainforest reserves worldwide through partnerships, community engagement and donor support.
“Developing countries may be less enthusiastic since developed countries have not delivered the financial resources promised at the last COP,” Deutsch told Eco-Business.
Wealthy nations have pooled less than US$11 billion in total for the GBF Fund since 2022.
“There is growing concern here that the level of ambition will fall far short of global biodiversity targets,” said Climate Action Network’s Catalina Gonda. “The Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework calls for closing the estimated US$700 billion annual biodiversity funding gap.”
Biodiversity action hinges on whether rich nations can mobilise US$20 billion annually by 2025 for developing countries, added Gonda. The Climate Action Network is a coalition of more than 1,900 civil society organisations in over 130 countries driving collective and sustainable action.
“We need to recognise that implementing NBSAPs in low-income countries – without strong financial systems – will still be mainly funded through conventional aid budgets. This is why [we should hold] wealthy governments to account, making sure they pay their fair share to support nature recovery globally,” explained James Pilkington, senior sustainable finance specialist at ZSL.
The Philippines’ Center for Energy, Ecology, and Development (CEED) executive director Gerry Arances said that while Southeast Asia hosts rich key biodiversity hotspots, Asean nations still grapple with development pressures, limited institutional capacity and competing economic priorities.
“The fact that even megadiverse countries that host critical ecosystems are lagging behind is particularly alarming,” noted Arances. “Even a number of nations in the G7 [a club of mostly rich countries] failed to deliver updated plans – further harming confidence in developed nations’ commitment to delivering finance targets for biodiversity protection.”
G7 nations Germany and the UK are among the countries not to publish new national pledges. They are joined by the US which has never ratified the treaty of the Convention on Biological Diversity.
“There’s a lack of urgency in translating global commitments into national action, and we’re seeing a repeat of the patterns that led to the failure of the Aichi Biodiversity Targets [strategic objectives adopted by the CBD after the 2010 Conference of the Parties in Aichi Prefecture, Japan] a decade ago,” concluded Arances. “Without concrete, time-bound commitments, we risk the Global Biodiversity Framework becoming yet another set of unfulfilled promises.”
Ahead of the COP16 kickoff in her home country, Colombia environment minister Susana Muhamad highlighted that “conservation and care of biodiversity [should be] positioned on the same level as decarbonisation and energy transition.”
“It is important to emphasise that the quality of these [NBSAP] plans is paramount,” said WWF-Malaysia’s Lavanya. “Clear, actionable steps and a transparent implementation framework are essential to ensure effective biodiversity conservation and sustainable development.”
The World Economic Forum names biodiversity loss and ecosystem collapse as among the most severe risks to economies in Southeast Asia in the next decade. The region’s accelerated extinction rate could result in a loss of natural capital that could put 63 per cent of the Asia Pacific region’s gross domestic product at risk, shaving off some US$19 trillion from the region’s economy.
