Nations Pledge to Protect 30 Percent of the Planet

On 19 December 2022, delegates attending the fifteenth Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity adopted a sweeping multilateral agreement in Montreal, Canada. Known as the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, the accord emerged following prolonged negotiations initially scheduled to take place in Kunming, China, during October 2020. Pandemics and domestic health restrictions in China led to postponements and a relocation of hosting responsibilities to Montreal, the seat of the treaty secretariat, while retaining the names of both cities to reflect their roles in the process.

The diplomatic effort took place against mounting scientific warnings regarding human-induced ecological collapse, often identified as the Holocene extinction event. International assessments had indicated that roughly one million animal and plant species faced extinction, threatening ecosystems relied upon by billions of people. Earlier multilateral commitments, most notably the Aichi Biodiversity Targets established for the 2011 to 2020 cycle, had fallen short of arresting environmental degradation. Prompted by rising public and financial sector concern, negotiators sought an ambitious policy benchmark that observers frequently likened to the role played by the Paris Agreement in climate policy.