Ivan Carrillo
During the high-level plenary of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (COP16), held in October in Cali, Colombia, an Indigenous representative offered a powerful analogy to illustrate the crucial role of Indigenous peoples in biodiversity conservation. In her speech, she compared their contribution to having Lionel Messi on a soccer team but paying him only 1% of his salary.
The metaphor highlighted the disparity between the importance of Indigenous communities’ work in protecting ecosystems and the resources they receive in return. It also underscored the need to allocate sufficient financial resources for biodiversity conservation.
However, international negotiations stall when it comes to numbers. Despite the financial commitments made during COP15 in Kunming, China, and Montreal, Canada, in 2021 and 2022—where wealthy nations pledged US$20 billion annually for conservation by 2025 and US$30 billion by 2030—the funds raised at the Cali meeting barely reached US$400 million.
Biologist Gerardo Ceballos, a researcher at the Institute of Ecology of the National Autonomous University of Mexico, emphasized that “biodiversity conservation is not an expense but a strategic investment that enables the survival of all other economic activities.” He argues that framing it as a “conservation cost” generates resistance while presenting it as an investment highlights its long-term social, economic, and political benefits.
Meanwhile, Lorenzo Rosenzweig, an expert in conservation finance, warns that businesses must recognize biodiversity loss as a risk to their operations.
“If the natural environment does not survive, neither will my business in the long term,” he says. He also stresses the need to diversify funding sources for conservation, integrate public spending, philanthropy, and private investment, and eliminate subsidies for environmentally harmful activities.
Is conservation an expense or an investment? We have yet to grasp this dilemma, as flora and fauna face critical threats.
A call for immediate action
The 2024 Living Planet Report by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) paints an alarming picture: since 1970, monitored species populations have declined by an average of 69%. The situation is even more critical in Latin America, with a 94% reduction over the past five decades. These figures are devastating for biodiversity and pose a direct threat to the stability of ecosystems that sustain life on Earth.
“Biodiversity underpins human life and, consequently, our societies. Yet, all global indicators of the state of nature show a decline,” the report states. From the food and water we consume to the air we breathe and the medicines we need, nature acts as a life-support system without which humanity cannot thrive.
Despite this, the global economy often overlooks this critical interdependence. Yet, the financial system is inherently reliant on nature’s ecosystem services, such as pollination, climate regulation, water purification, and soil fertility. These services are not just beneficial, they are essential for food production, human health, water security, and climate change mitigation.
Few examples illustrate the relationship between biodiversity and ecosystem services better than the jaguar, the largest feline in the Americas. Beyond being a cultural symbol of Latin America, the jaguar plays a key role in the stability and health of the ecosystems it inhabits, providing economic and environmental benefits that often go unnoticed.
A WWF report published on International Jaguar Day (November 29) reveals that the 15 Priority Jaguar Landscapes, spanning 244.3 million hectares across 14 countries, generate between US$1.5 and US$4 trillion annually in ecosystem services. This economic value exceeds the region’s recorded economic activity—including sectors like trade, transportation, and banking—by up to six times.
How do jaguars contribute economically? By protecting their territory, jaguars facilitate various indispensable ecosystem services for human development, such as regulating soil erosion, local climate, flood control, and water purification. These services are essential for activities like agriculture and livestock farming.
Simultaneously, the habitats protected by jaguars provide fresh water, food, raw materials, and genetic resources. The latter are exploited by industries such as pharmaceuticals and cosmetics, among others. The jaguar’s contributions extend to cultural services, where landscapes become attractions for nature tourism, and to spiritual values for local communities and society. They also support fundamental processes like soil formation and photosynthesis, which are the basis of life on Earth.
Despite this multifaceted impact, these services are rarely economically valued in current financial models. As Roberto Troya, WWF’s Regional Director for Latin America and the Caribbean, notes in the report: “The jaguar is much more than a cultural symbol; it represents a strategic resource for the environmental and economic stability of the region.”
He adds that the current economic model fails by not incorporating these services as central elements of the system. A paradigm shift is needed to truly value and protect biodiversity.
The global economy faces physical risks by ignoring ecosystem dependence, such as resource scarcity, rising production costs, and supply chain disruptions. It also confronts transition risks, such as increasing social and regulatory pressure to adopt sustainable practices.
These risks are not mere abstractions but represent a tangible threat to financial stability and global prosperity. WWF’s 2024 Living Planet Report shows that more than half of global GDP (55%), equivalent to about US$58 trillion, depends moderately or highly on nature and its services.
Contrasts at COP16
At COP16 in Cali, Colombia, significant progress was made in biodiversity financing, notably the creation of the “Cali Fund”, an innovative mechanism designed to distribute benefits from digital genetic information. This fund aims to have companies in sectors like pharmaceuticals and cosmetics contribute 1% of their profits or 0.1% of their revenues, with 50% of the funds going to Indigenous peoples, local communities, Afro-descendants, women, and youth.
María Inés Rivadeneira of WWF Latin America and the Caribbean emphasizes that while there is no precise estimate of its potential, the profits of these industries—which rival tech companies in the stock market—suggest the fund could generate significant resources.
In another track of the negotiations, an anticipated agreement to establish a new global biodiversity fund did not materialize. Rivadeneira acknowledges that there is currently a funding gap of approximately US$700 billion to implement the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, which sets goals to halt and reverse global biodiversity loss by 2030, promoting conservation, sustainable use, and equitable benefit-sharing.
In contrast, financial commitments at COP16 were notably smaller, intensifying frustration among developing countries. These nations argue that the global economic model—driven by wealthier countries—is the primary driver of biodiversity threats, and they demand greater financial accountability.
In this context, opinions on the usefulness of COPs diverge. Gerardo Ceballos questions the effectiveness of these international meetings, viewing them as a distraction from concrete, necessary actions.
“Organizing events like these, with over 15,000 participants and exorbitant costs, does not address the scale of the problem. It creates a false perception of effective agreements, but in reality, the outcomes are minimal,” he warns, criticizing the lack of binding mechanisms to ensure compliance with commitments.
María Inés Rivadeneira, while acknowledging persistent challenges—particularly around implementation and funding—affirms that COP16 yielded positive results. The diversity of Latin American participation enriched the dialogue with regional perspectives. At the same time, milestones were achieved, such as recognizing traditional knowledge of Indigenous and Afro-descendant peoples, the aforementioned Cali Fund, an action plan to address the connection between health and biodiversity, and guidelines for conserving special marine areas.
Above all, WWF’s Policy Leader for Latin America and the Caribbean advocates for a shift in perspective:
Financial obstacles and solutions for conservation
Conservation financing faces profound challenges, not only in terms of available funds but also due to the bureaucracy and inefficiency of current mechanisms. Developing countries, home to much of the planet’s biodiversity, have expressed frustration with the Convention on Biological Diversity’s financial mechanism, the Global Environment Facility (GEF), describing it as cumbersome and slow. These nations, grappling with the most severe consequences of biodiversity loss, are demanding a new global fund that is more accessible and efficient.
María Inés Rivadeneira highlights this demand: “Developing countries are insisting on this compliance because the major threats to biodiversity in Latin America, Africa, and island nations are not directly caused by these countries but by how the global market operates.”
Experts say that for biodiversity financing to advance effectively, it is crucial to reframe the narrative, from discussing the “cost of conservation” to speaking of a strategic investment with economic, social, and environmental returns.
Transforming biodiversity conservation financing requires decisive action from both governments and the private sector. Governments responsible for public policies must increase conservation spending, eliminate harmful subsidies, and establish incentives for sustainable practices, integrating environmental protection into economic strategies. Meanwhile, businesses must align their models with sustainability, investing in restoration projects and supporting innovative financial mechanisms like green bonds and impact funds.
Messi at COP16
Beyond the metaphor used during the COP16 plenary comparing Indigenous peoples’ role in conservation to Messi’s in soccer, the Argentinean star left his mark on COP16 with a virtual message.
In a video, Messi held a globe and declared: “What I hold in my hands is something precious, worth gold, and there’s only one. We can take care of it with effort and a collective sense of purpose.”
The eight-time Ballon d’Or winner, considered by many to be the world’s best soccer player, did not directly address conservation financing. But his closing remark resonated with an undeniable truth: “The greatest title is achieving peace with nature. Let’s unite to protect life, nature and people.”
This story was produced with support from Internews’ Earth Journalism Network. It was first published in Spanish by El Universal (Mexico) and has been translated to English and lightly edited for length and clarity.
BOX 1
“Everything would change if we understood that the economy exists within ecosystems, not as an external or satellite system,” says Lorenzo Rosenzweig. “The economy is an integral part of nature, the space in which we all live.”
BOX 2
“Environmental problems are not just environmental—they are economic, political, and social issues. Biodiversity policy, like climate change and pollution policies, must be intersectoral and multilevel, integrated into state planning.”
BOX 3
“If we invested the resources needed to mitigate the problem, we would create countless jobs, build infrastructure, and generate immense indirect well-being through nature protection,” says Gerardo Ceballos.