CBD COP17: Nigeria deploys BIOFIN, Net-Zero Plan to link biodiversity with national investments

Nigeria’s focal point to the CBD, Sikeade Egbuwalo and other government representatives, during her intervention at the Technical-Level Dialogue between Finance and Environment Ministries at the ongoing CBD COP17 negotiations in Armenia.

The Nigerian government says it is working with relevant stakeholders through initiatives such as the Biodiversity Finance Initiative (BIOFIN) and the National Net-Zero Nature-Positive Implementation Plan to connect biodiversity priorities with national planning, financing needs and investment opportunities.

Nigeria’s focal point to the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), Sikeade Egbuwalo, disclosed this during the country’s intervention at the Technical-Level Dialogue between Finance and Environment Ministries at the ongoing CBD COP17 negotiations in Armenia.

The dialogue was convened as part of efforts to implement CBD Decision 16/34 on resource mobilisation.

“We recognise the importance of synergies between biodiversity and climate change. However, synergy must not translate into hierarchy,” Mrs Egbuwalo told delegates.

She said integrated approaches should strengthen both agendas without subordinating biodiversity financing to climate finance.

Nigeria’s BIOFIN programme was launched in late 2025 in partnership with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) to help close the country’s biodiversity financing gap and support nature conservation and sustainable ecosystem management.

Since negotiations began last week, biodiversity financing has remained one of the most contentious issues, particularly for developing countries seeking substantial financial support to implement the global biodiversity framework.

Discussions have focused on mobilising additional public and private funding, improving access to existing resources and redirecting environmentally harmful subsidies towards activities that support nature conservation.

A major issue is the implementation of the Cali Fund, established following COP16 to support benefit-sharing from the commercial use of digital sequence information (DSI) on genetic resources.

The mechanism seeks to ensure that companies benefiting from the commercial use of such information contribute to biodiversity conservation and its sustainable use.

For African countries, the debate is closely linked to equity, resource ownership and the continent’s capacity to finance conservation.

African negotiators argue that the continent’s rich biological resources support commercial activities worldwide, while the benefits generated from their use do not adequately reach the countries and communities from which those resources originate.

They are pushing for benefit-sharing arrangements that deliver tangible financial resources for biodiversity protection, community development and the implementation of national conservation plans.

Negotiators are also discussing ways to mobilise private investment and redirect environmentally harmful subsidies. The Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework calls for at least $500 billion annually in harmful incentives to be eliminated or redirected by 2030.

During its intervention, Nigeria strongly advocated for facilitating dialogue between Finance and Environment Ministries under paragraph 26(a) of Decision 16/34, citing a fundamental gap in how biodiversity is positioned within national and international financial decision-making.

“Our central concern is that nature and biodiversity must be accorded the same level of political, institutional and financial priority as climate change,” Mrs Egbuwalo said.

She argued that climate change was not a greater or more important crisis than biodiversity loss, stressing that both were interconnected, equally urgent and fundamental to sustainable development.

According to her, climate change has received significant attention from finance ministries, national budget authorities, development banks and international financial institutions over the years, while biodiversity has not enjoyed the same level of recognition and financial prioritisation.

“Nature is not a subset of climate change. Biodiversity has its own intrinsic, ecological and economic value. We should not have to justify investments in biodiversity solely on the basis of their contribution to climate mitigation or adaptation,” she said.

Mrs Egbuwalo said Nigeria pushed for the dialogue under Decision 16/34 because biodiversity needed to move beyond the exclusive responsibility of Environment Ministries and become a core consideration in fiscal policies, national budgets, public investment decisions and economic development planning.

She noted that Finance Ministries play a central role in resource allocation, fiscal incentives, taxation and investment policies.

Without their active engagement, she said, the ambitious commitments under the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework would remain difficult to implement.

Nigeria also maintained that resource mobilisation was not solely about generating new financing but also about redirecting existing financial flows, reforming incentives harmful to biodiversity and ensuring that national expenditure supported, rather than undermined, nature.

The country said it expected the technical dialogue to produce practical recommendations on institutional collaboration, biodiversity-responsive budgeting, dedicated financing instruments and stronger engagement by Finance Ministries in implementing National Biodiversity Strategies and Action Plans (NBSAPs).

Mrs Egbuwalo said Nigeria wanted a fundamental shift in how governments prioritised climate and biodiversity financing.

“We cannot continue to treat climate change as an economic priority while biodiversity remains largely an environmental responsibility,” she said.

She added that nature’s protection deserved equally strong financial and institutional commitments, expressing hope that the dialogue would move governments from recognising the importance of biodiversity to taking concrete action.