2nd GBFF Council Meeting

The Council spent the bulk of the third day in the Council meetings of the Global Biodiversity Framework Fund (GBFF) and the Least Developed Countries Fund/ Special Climate Change Fund (LDCF/SCCF), approving the first GBFF Work Program, amounting to $37.8 million

The GBFF work program comprised three projects:

• Conserving Mexican biodiversity through communities and their protected areas;
• Biodiversity Conservation in Indigenous Lands, in Brazil; and
• Caatinga Protected Areas Program, in Brazil.

During the discussion, most Council members and constituency groups took the floor, recognizing the historic nature of the adoption of this first work program. Council members highlighted the agreement that the GBFF portfolio should target 39% of funding for LDCs and Small Island Developing States and expressed hope that future work programs would move towards this allocation. Speakers also noted there was agreement that international financial institutions (IFIs) and multilateral development banks (MDBs) would receive 25% of project funding, with the goal of helping these implementing agencies to scale up their biodiversity funding. Several speakers encouraged IFIs and MDBs to submit more requests in the next funding round.

Benjamin Bélair, Quebec’s Delegate in Washington, DC, underscored the long-standing engagement of Quebec in international cooperation, through international climate cooperation projects, and support, among others, to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD).

While thanking Canada, Germany, Japan, Luxembourg, Spain, and the United Kingdom for their support to the GBFF, Carlos Manuel Rodríguez stressed that more resources are urgently needed.

Following the adoption, David Cooper, Acting Executive Secretary, CBD, congratulated the Council and commended it on the speed in which it responded to the request of CBD COP15 to establish the fund.