{"id":167521,"date":"2026-10-19T11:27:08","date_gmt":"2026-10-19T09:27:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.justiceinfo.net\/?p=167521"},"modified":"2026-10-19T11:27:12","modified_gmt":"2026-10-19T09:27:12","slug":"cop17-new-wave-of-biodiversity-legal-challenges-coming-up","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.justiceinfo.net\/en\/167521-cop17-new-wave-of-biodiversity-legal-challenges-coming-up.html","title":{"rendered":"COP17: new wave of biodiversity legal challenges coming up"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

As the global extinction of species continues, COP17 on biodiversity opens this October 19 in Yerevan, Armenia. And with climate-related legal challenges on the rise, can judicial action compel States to better fulfil their obligations on biodiversity?<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Across the globe, the collapse of biodiversity continues at an ever faster rate. Wild vertebrate populations fell by 73% between 1970 and 2022, according to World Wildlife Fund\u2019s Living Planet Report 2026<\/a>. In the latest edition of its Global Red List<\/a>, the International Union for Conservation of Nature lists, out of 175,909 species studied, 49,505 species \u2013 nearly a third \u2013 threatened with extinction: 44% of reef-building corals, 41% of amphibians, 38% of sharks and rays, 38% of trees, 26% of mammals and 11% birds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Against this backdrop of urgency, the COP17 on biological diversity<\/a> takes place from October 19 to 30, 2026 in Yerevan, Armenia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is the 17th<\/sup> conference of the 196 States Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity<\/a>, signed at the Rio Earth Summit in 1992. Its main focus is follow-up to the Kunming\u2013Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework<\/a>, adopted at COP15 in 2021\u20132022.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Laying out objectives for 2050, this document sets 23 quantified targets to be met by 2030, including: restoring 30% of degraded areas; protecting 30% of land and seas; halving pesticide-related risks; a reduction in subsidies harmful to biodiversity amounting to $500 billion per year; and the transfer of $30 billion per year from developed to developing countries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Failure to act on the scale of the crisis<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

But with four years to go until the 2030 deadline, these targets seem out of reach: the draft Biodiversity Action Report<\/a>, due to be published at COP17, highlights a significant delay. \u201cCollectively, we are not acting on the scale required,\u201d says Astrid Schomaker, Executive Secretary of the Convention on Biological Diversity. \u201cTo achieve the targets, we need a response from societies as a whole.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Under the 1992 Rio Convention on Biological Diversity, as well as the climate change convention signed in the same year, it is indeed States that are bound by international law to halt the loss of biodiversity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, the latest report from IPBES<\/a> (the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services) -- biodiversity equivalent of the IPCC -- highlights the responsibility of companies in this mass extinction of species, in the same way that the Carbon Majors report<\/a> highlighted in 2017 the responsibility of fossil fuel companies in climate change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"The
The Global Living Planet Index is based on data collected on 5,790 vertebrate species between 1970 and 2022. It shows that the overall size of these populations has fallen by 73 per cent over this period. However, looking beyond this average figure, around half of the populations studied are stable or increasing, according to the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n