Historic Worldwide Deal Made to End Biodiversity Loss

More than four years in the making, a historic deal was struck in Montreal, Canada – at the biodiversity Cop15 and signed by almost all the countries in the world – to halt the destruction of our planet’s ecosystems.

“Just six months ago, we didn’t know if we were going to even be able to have this conference and or even less to be able to adopt this historic document,” says Steven Guilbeault, Minister of Environment and Climate Change of Canada. “And this was only possible through the collaboration of all countries present here tonight.”

Co-hosted by Canada and China, the Montreal-Kunming agreement was struck following an extraordinary plenary that lasted more than seven hours. The deal includes protecting 30% of the planet for nature by 2030, reforming $500 billion of environmental subsidies, and restoring 30% of the Earth’s degraded terrestrial, inland water, coastal, and marine ecosystems. It was also agreed upon that urgent actions must be taken to halt human-caused extinctions of endangered species and promote their recovery. A new fund will be created within the United Nations’ primary existing biodiversity financing mechanism called the global environment facility, and rich countries have agreed to provide $30 billion of aid for biodiversity by 2030. Despite the fact that the agreement isn’t legally binding, governments will have to adopt national biodiversity plans and show their progress in meeting them. Therefore, significant changes could be made to farming, business supply chains, and the role of Indigenous communities in conservation.