A group of Imperial College delegates visited a rainy Manchester last week (2-8 February) to attend the 12th Plenary session of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). Read Dr Caroline Howe’s explainer on IPBES to catch-up! In this blog, the delegation shares their summaries and reflections.
The goal of IPBES 12 was to negotiate a historic assessment on the impact of business activities on nature, called the Summary for Policymakers of the new Methodological Assessment of the Impact and Dependency of Business on Biodiversity and Nature’s Contributions to People. With an urgent need for businesses to address their impacts on biodiversity and nature, this assessment comes at a critical time: UNEP’s 2026 State of Finance Report highlights that private finance harming nature totals USD 4.9 trillion annually. Below, members of Imperial’s delegation summarise the key points from the negotiations.
Stakeholder Day
IPBES 12 kicked off with a day dedicated to stakeholders, recognising that translation of IPBES’ science and policy options into real-world impact depends on collaboration across government, business, civil society, and beyond.
The Plenary highlighted the role of global networks to support the uptake and impact of IPBES assessments across diverse contexts. One example of this is the Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services Network’s support to translate the 2016 IPBES assessment on pollinators, pollination and food production into Nigerian policy, cited by Andrew Iloh from Nigeria’s Biodiversity and Education Resource Centre.
Marta Koch from Imperial’s Centre for Environmental Policy shared insights on the uptake of IPBES and scientific collaboration during the poster session and in her role as Monitoring Assessment Reviewer. Marta presented her novel nexus stakeholder engagement methodology for mapping climate and sustainability digital and physical monitoring technologies, informed by the IPBES Conceptual Framework via the Young ES Specialists in-person and online posters (view here).
Reflections at the Stakeholder Day’s close and throughout the IPBES12 parallel programme suggest that many businesses are already keen to act on the findings of the most recent IPBES assessment on Business and Biodiversity; however, businesses must overcome barriers including siloed information, disconnection and distrust between actor groups, and intellectual property. A ‘badges off at the door’ approach was suggested to bring businesses together to share information and collaborate.
A key theme was the potential for businesses to act as champions for biodiversity-positive action, helping to actively shape the enabling environment through peer learning. By sharing lessons learnt from sector-specific case studies these ‘champions’ could help counter fears of greenhushing and encourage more timely, transparent, and evidence-informed action.
Working Group I (WGI)
The key objective of WGI was to negotiate the Summary for Policymakers (SPM) for the Business and Biodiversity Assessment. Co-Chairs, IPBES experts, negotiators, and observers (when supported by a national delegation) conducted a line-by-line review of the SPM and made negotiated edits before the final version is voted on.
Throughout the negotiations, four key topics were particularly contentious:
- The mention of the interconnected challenges of biodiversity loss, climate change, and pollution was heavily debated. The final text recognises that they are interconnected but avoids explicitly calling it a ‘challenge’ or ‘crisis’.
- The reluctance to mention that the decline in biodiversity and nature’s contributions to people, including ecosystem services, are a threat not only to human wellbeing but also human rights. This relates to the UN General Assembly 2022 declaring “access to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment, a universal human right”. It was debated whether the term “human wellbeing” was inclusive or not of human rights, with some delegates wanting to explicitly distinguish between the two.
- Whether the specific mention of nature-negative subsidies for specific sectors (e.g., agriculture, fossil fuels, forestry) should be called out, or if aggregated numbers should be used instead.
- The role of free, prior, and informed consent (FPIC) for Indigenous People and local communities when collaborating with private sector. First, it was debated whether FPIC is a right of Indigenous Peoples and also local communities. The distinction between Indigenous People and local communities is very context dependent, therefore it is important to also recognise the rights of local communities and ethical processes to work with them. Secondly, the scope of FPIC was discussed to conclude that it is not only restricted to the Nagoya Protocol on Access and Benefit Sharing, which refers to the use of genetic resources, but also other elements of Indigenous and Local Knowledge.
Beyond these four topics, other contentious topics that stood out included: the responsibility of businesses and financial institutions to achieve global goals for biodiversity, who decides their level of responsibility and what does that mean; the distinction between collaboration and collective action driven by such institutions, as well as their mutual significance; the impact of trade-distorting subsidies on developing countries; the need to consider differing size, sector, local context and capacities of private businesses in each region and country.
Working Group II (WGII)
Across the convention centre, smaller negotiations were held to discuss IPBES institutional matters. With two assessments due to conclude this year (on monitoring, and on spatial planning and ecological connectivity), and the Second Global Assessment scheduled for completion in 2028, sights were firmly set on what comes next.
Delegations reflected on four priority themes identified by the IPBES Bureau and Multidisciplinary Expert Panel: pollution; poverty; cities; and climate change. Given its relevance across health, livelihoods and economies, as well as the transboundary nature of the crisis on land, air and oceans, pollution was a popular choice. Discussions also highlighted the significant financial, technical and time demands of standard assessments, prompting consideration of alternative formats such as synthesis reports or technical papers. Ultimately, no new assessment was agreed, and the issue was tabled for further consideration at next October’s IPBES Plenary.
Beyond future work, WGII focussed on improving the effectiveness IPBES and the uptake of its assessments. This encompassed continued support for the fellowship programme for early-career researchers, youth workshops to boost engagement of young people with IPBES and stronger engagement with IPBES national focal points to encourage awareness and policy uptake.
Conclusion: 2030 and IPBES13
Observing IPBES12 firsthand offered a window into the realities of global biodiversity governance, shaped not only by science but by the challenge of dialogue across countries, sectors, and knowledge systems.
As we look to 2030, when the targets of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework are due, we will be keenly following deliberations at the upcoming IPBES13 – focused on biodiversity monitoring, spatial planning and connectivity and beyond.
