Cali biodiversity fund raises less than $11,000

{"text":[[{"start":7.62,"text":"For an example of the highs and lows of multilateral climate talks, look to the Cali Fund."}],[{"start":13.32,"text":"Announced at the UN COP16 biodiversity summit in the Colombian city of Cali in 2024, the fund set out to raise $1bn a year. It asked companies profiting from genetic materials — such as pharmaceutical companies — to pay towards protecting biodiversity in the nature-rich developing countries where much of their products originate."}],[{"start":33.32,"text":"The move was one of a set of measures intended to halt the global decline of nature and enjoyed support from all the roughly 190 countries present at the talks in Cali."}],[{"start":42.56,"text":"Yet companies were not legally compelled to pay into the fund. Even as country leaders gathered in Yerevan, Armenia for COP17 last month — one of a clutch of COP summits this year — to discuss how to raise money to protect biodiversity, the Cali Fund held less than $11,000."}],[{"start":59.76,"text":"“Businesses have a clear interest in helping to conserve the ecosystems that underpin all of their future economic value,” says Eva Zabey, chief executive of biodiversity advocacy group Business for Nature. “But without making some of these actions [like the Cali Fund] mandatory . . . we’re not going to see action at the scale and speed required.”"}],[{"start":null,"text":""}],[{"start":79.62,"text":"Human activity threatens more than 1mn animal and plant species with extinction. The scale of ecological collapse presents a seismic risk to the economy, with the World Economic Forum calculating that more than half of global GDP depends on nature."}],[{"start":93.92,"text":"At Montreal’s COP15 biodiversity summit in 2022, almost 200 countries agreed to meet 23 targets by 2030. These include phasing out subsidies that harm nature, protecting 30 per cent of land and oceans, and raising $200bn per year to finance nature protection."}],[{"start":null,"text":""}],[{"start":111.96,"text":"In the days leading up to COP17, a UN report found member states were on track to meet fewer than half of the agreed targets."}],[{"start":119.64,"text":"Cali Fund advocates in Yerevan sought agreement on compelling companies to pay into the fund. They were unsuccessful."}],[{"start":124.36,"text":"“The Cali fund hasn’t taken off at all,” says Marco Lambertini, former director-general of WWF International who now heads the Nature Positive Initiative. “Business should be shown that this fund is not philanthropy, but it is actually an investment in resilience.”"}],[{"start":141,"text":"Lambertini is nonetheless hopeful. “We’re late and nature is underfunded. But that doesn’t mean progress hasn’t been made,” he says, adding that he is encouraged by the surge in corporate interest at the summits. There were just over 300 private sector attendees at the biodiversity COP in 2018, he notes, whereas in Cali there were over 3,000."}],[{"start":161.92,"text":"Zabey is similarly heartened by the rising private sector turnout but acknowledges that engagement does not guarantee results. At COP17, Zabey drove discussions on subsidy reform, a critical target she believes the Cali summit failed to address."}],[{"start":176.16,"text":"A UN report in January found that governments spend $2.4tn per year on subsidies that harm nature, including state-backed payouts incentivising deforestation and overfishing."}],[{"start":187.32,"text":"Phasing out these subsidies is “an economic no-brainer”, says Zabey. “You’re using public money to subsidise nature-negative activities,” she says. “Then, when there’s environmental harm, that same government must pay for the clean-up.”"}],[{"start":null,"text":""}],[{"start":200.56,"text":"The biodiversity framework agreed in 2022 aims to reduce harmful subsidies by at least $500bn per year. Negotiations around this goal are glacial. When Zabey arrived in Yerevan, only 5 per cent of governments had set national targets for the reform, she says, adding that subsidies are “politically sensitive”."}],[{"start":220.64,"text":"She had hoped to sway delegates by pointing to Ecuador, which redirected funds previously allocated to diesel subsidies into green credit programmes. “It’s not about more money [but] using public money in a smarter way with a long-term view of resilience and competitiveness,” she says."}],[{"start":236.94,"text":"COP17 ended with delegates expressing “deep concern” about progress, however, finally agreeing on a plan dubbed the Yerevan Pathway to step up efforts to meet their biodiversity goals ahead of the next summit in 2028."}],[{"start":249.72,"text":"The biodiversity summit is one of three UN COP events this year, including the climate talks in Turkey this month and a desertification summit held in Mongolia in August. While they are rooted in independent UN treaties and cover separate issues, the crises are so interconnected, argues Lambertini, that it is time the summits combined."}],[{"start":270.04,"text":"“They were created decades ago and it’s time to refresh,” he says. “We should focus on integration so we can speak to each other more clearly. That’s when we’ll have more implementation.”"}],[{"start":280.84,"text":"Akim Daouda, former chief executive of Gabon’s sovereign wealth fund, is nonetheless doubtful that any amount of alignment will deliver action at the scale and pace required."}],[{"start":291.44,"text":"“The challenges that we’re trying to overcome are still progressing,” says Daouda. “I don’t believe the solution is in pursuing unilateral mechanisms.”"}],[{"start":301.12,"text":"He recalls Gabon’s 2010 ban on the export of raw logs, which curbed large-scale felling and encouraged local wood processing, protecting biodiversity while also driving economic growth."}],[{"start":313.04,"text":"Taking action in this way may be more effective than relying on international conferences, he suggests: “It is up to countries in [biodiverse] regions to start creating value and shifting the conversation from value distribution to value creation.”"}],[{"start":328.76,"text":"Data visualisation by Steve Bernard"}],[{"start":335.91,"text":""}]],"url":"https://audio.ftcn.net.cn/album/a_1794212328_1483.mp3"}