Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what recent assessment he has made of the UK's preparedness for the COP-15 summit in October 2021.

The Secretariat of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) announced on 18 August that CBD COP15 will now be scheduled to take place as a two-part Summit. In August, China announced that there will be a virtual, High-Level Segment from the 11 to 15 October 2021 followed by an in-person event in Kunming, China, from 25 April to 8 May 2022.

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs is responsible for representing the UK at meetings of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity and is committed to playing a leading role in developing an ambitious post-2020 global biodiversity framework to be adopted at COP15 of the Convention on Biological Diversity. As part of this framework the UK is advocating ambitious global targets to bend the curve of biodiversity loss by 2030, including targets to ensure more ocean and land is protected, ecosystems are restored, species population sizes are recovering and, that by 2050 extinctions are halted. This ambitious set of targets must be supported by increased finance for nature and strengthened reporting and review mechanisms to facilitate the achievement of them.

To secure this ambition, the UK has participated fully in each of the virtual negotiations sessions which have taken place this year. In addition, the UK, in partnership with Norway, is leading a programme of workshops for Parties to enhance planning, reporting and review mechanisms to strengthen the implementation mechanisms of the post-2020 global biodiversity framework and the CBD. We are working internationally, including through the Leaders’ Pledge for Nature; the UK-led Global Ocean Alliance; in our role as Ocean Co-Chair of the High Ambition Coalition for Nature and People and bilaterally with priority countries to secure a successful CBD outcome.

We must tackle the biodiversity crisis head on, and the delay to these important negotiations is no excuse for taking our foot off the pedal. We hope more countries will use the extra time to join us in safeguarding and financing nature conservation to ensure the adoption of a truly ambitious post-2020 global biodiversity framework.