COP17: Accelerating Place-Based Action for Nature and People
Our latest blog explores how COP17 can accelerate coordinated, place-based action and investment to turn global biodiversity commitments into measurable outcomes for nature, people and resilient economies.
Ecosystem-based, landscape, seascape, watershed and jurisdictional approaches, alongside nature-based solutions, are complementary forms of place-based action that strengthen socio-ecological resilience. COP17 must move beyond agreements, assessments and plans to coordinated action and investment, prioritizing key locations while scaling ambition, quality and long-term commitment to deliver the goals and targets of the Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF).
The 17th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (COP17), taking place in Yerevan, Armenia, from 19 to 30 October 2026, is an opportunity to assess progress and accelerate implementation of the GBF. Place-based action can bridge the gap between national ambition and local delivery by bringing together planning, investment, implementation and stakeholders across jurisdictions, ecosystems, landscapes, seascapes, and watersheds.
Making nature action practical: connecting global commitments with action on the ground
The Convention on Biological Diversity recognizes the Ecosystem Approach as the primary framework for action and defines it as an integrated strategy for managing land, water and living resources that promotes conservation and sustainable use in an equitable way. COP decision V/6 endorsed its description, principles and operational guidance, while decision VII/11 emphasized implementation and welcomed additional practical guidance. Together, these decisions provide a foundation for coordinated and inclusive implementation of all GBF goals and targets.
Ecosystem-based approaches (EBAs), landscape, watershed, seascape and jurisdictional approaches (LA/JAs), and nature-based solutions (NbS) share an overarching place-based objective: socio-ecological resilience.
NbS can operate at different scales and address one or several societal challenges. EBAs and LA/JAs connect biodiversity, climate, sustainable production and human well-being benefits through inclusive long-term governance and transparent monitoring.
LA/JAs put ecosystem-based management into practice through landscape, seascape and watershed plans. NbS complement these approaches by providing targeted interventions that can start at site or production-unit scale, but must be connected, coordinated and scaled across the wider place to support system-wide transformation and socio-ecological resilience.
Table 1. Place-based interventions alignment through the Landscape Practitioner Network Core Criteria for Mature Landscape Initiatives.
Core criteria for Mature Landscape Initiatives | Nature-based solutions | Landscape, watershed, seascape and jurisdictional approaches | |
|---|---|---|---|
Scale | Principle 3: Ecosystem managers should consider the effects (actual or potential) of their activities on adjacent and other ecosystems. Principle 6: Ecosystems must be managed within the limits of their functioning. Principle 7: The ecosystem approach should be undertaken at the appropriate spatial and temporal scales. | Can operate from site or production-unit to ecosystem, landscape or jurisdictional scale, depending on the societal challenge. | Works at landscape or jurisdictional scale, connecting multiple land uses, ecosystems and actors within a defined place. |
Multistakeholder governance | Principle 2: Management should be decentralized to the lowest appropriate level. Principle 12: The ecosystem approach should involve all relevant sectors of society and scientific disciplines. | May be led by one organization or several stakeholders. Inclusive participation, rights, local knowledge and equitable benefit-sharing remain important; governance arrangements vary. | Requires multistakeholder governance and coordination to involve governments, companies, communities, Indigenous Peoples and other relevant actors. |
Collective goals and collective action | Principle 1: The objectives of management of land, water, and living resources are a matter of societal choice. Principle 4: Recognizing potential gains from management, there is usually a need to understand and manage the ecosystem in an economic context. Principle 5: Conservation of ecosystem structure and functioning, in order to maintain ecosystem services, should be a priority target of the ecosystem approach. Principle 10: The ecosystem approach should seek the appropriate balance between, and integration of, conservation and use of biological diversity. | Can address a single societal challenge or several interrelated challenges while delivering benefits for biodiversity and human well-being. Its objectives don't necessarily need to be collectively defined or pursued through collective action. | Aligns stakeholders around shared environmental, social, and economic goals, and enables coordinated action across sectors and land uses. |
Collective monitoring framework | Principle 11: The ecosystem approach should consider all forms of relevant information, including scientific and indigenous and local knowledge, innovations and practices. | Monitoring is tailored to the intervention and the societal challenge, biodiversity outcomes and human wellbeing benefits it seeks to deliver. It may be undertaken by the implementing organization and does not necessarily require a shared monitoring framework. | Establishes a shared monitoring framework so stakeholders can assess progress, strengthen accountability, and adapt collective action over time. |
*Temporality | Principle 8: Recognizing the varying temporal scales and lag-effects that characterize ecosystem processes, objectives for ecosystem management should be set for the long term.
Principle 9: Management must recognize that change is inevitable. | Should be designed to sustain benefits over time and use adaptive management, but its duration may be bounded by a specific project or intervention rather than a shared long-term landscape transformation process. | Seeks landscape transformation and socio-ecological resilience across short-, medium- and long-term horizons, supported by durable governance and investment. |
*Temporality is a specific criterion from the Core Criteria presented separately in this paper, to compare the temporal dimensions and long-term characteristics of EBAs, LA/JAs and NbS.
Turning disclosure into action for nature
Nature strategies and transition plans must show how ambition, assessment and planning become place-based action. Through disclosure by companies, states and regions, CDP makes commitments, action and progress comparable across stakeholders and places, providing decision-useful data to track progress, identify gaps and help direct action and investment.
Companies and jurisdictions should explain what they aim to protect or restore and how they act where their dependencies, impacts, risks and opportunities occur. CDP already captures – and will increasingly capture – major biodiversity pressures through existing climate, forests, water and plastics disclosures.
This matters because GBF delivery depends on subnational governments connecting national ambition with local planning, investment and action. Their roles in land-use planning, natural resource management and convening actors make them essential to the implementation of National, Subnational and Local Biodiversity Strategies and Action Plans, jurisdictional REDD+ programmes and biological corridors spanning municipalities, states or provinces.
CDP corporate disclosure on LA/JAs rose from 27 companies in 2020 to 388 in 2025, while a further 381 companies reported plans to engage by 2027. The number of disclosed landscape and jurisdictional initiatives increased from 32 to 650 over the same period. In 2025, 79% of companies reporting engagement were concentrated in four sectors: Food, Beverages and Agriculture; Manufacturing; Materials; and Retail.
Private finance and public-private collaboration are now critical: two-thirds of the landscape and jurisdictional initiatives disclosed by states and regions have implementation plans ready, yet more than 80% rely only on government funding or subsidies to operate.
At COP17, the opportunity is to move beyond fragmented assessments and plans and make place-based action visible, measurable and transformative. Targeted NbS interventions can begin at site level, but they should connect and scale across ecosystems, landscapes, seascapes, watersheds and jurisdictions to strengthen socio-ecological resilience. These complementary approaches are urgently needed. Governments, companies and financial institutions must understand their interconnections, collaborate, invest and act with increasing scale, ambition, quality and long-term commitment.
Figure 1. A landscape can host multiple and nested place-based strategies, from site-level nature-based solutions to watershed, seascape, landscape and jurisdictional initiatives.
Final thought: turning global ambition into place-based action
Climate, nature, people, and economies are interconnected. Economies depend on healthy ecosystems and resilient communities. Agreements, assessments and plans are essential foundations, but their value lies in the action, behavioural change and transformation they enable for nature and people. Ecosystem-based, landscape, seascape, watershed and jurisdictional approaches, alongside NbS, turn ambition into coordinated place-based action that builds trust and strengthens socio-ecological resilience.
Place-based action is needed across sectors and geographies, must involve all relevant stakeholders, and span every stage of development. It requires long-term commitment to local stakeholders, collaboration with subnational jurisdictions, alignment of public and private action, and coordination across whole ecosystems, landscapes, seascapes and watersheds.
Governments, companies and financial institutions should invest in and implement credible, long-term place-based approaches and disclose their contribution to GBF delivery and socio-ecological resilience. Show where action happens, who is involved, how it connects and scales, and what outcomes it achieves for nature and people.