A subsidiary event of the 15th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (COP15) kicked off Sunday in Kunming, the capital of southwest China's Yunnan Province.

Co-hosted by the Secretariat Office of the Convention on Biological Diversity and the Ministry of Ecology and Environment (MEE), the two-day event is themed "The business and finance journey to Kunming: We are part of the solution."

The event is comprised of a series of sub-forums and high-level dialogues conducted both online and in Kunming with objectives to promote the engagement of the business community with the biodiversity and to raise awareness of the upcoming COP15 and the Post 2020 Global Biodiversity Framework as well as to call for ambitious commitments and concrete action from the private sector that can help revert biodiversity loss and build a healthier and more sustainable future for all.

Starting on the morning of June 6, the event kicked off with panel discussions covering topics including sustainable transformation and high-quality development of food system, sustainable sand use, sustainable supply chain and global ocean protection.

The event of June 7 started with a high-level speech by Zhao Yingmin, Vice Minister of MEE and a video speech by Elizabeth Maruma Mrema, Executive Secretary of CBD Secretariat Office, followed by five sub-forums on the topics of nature-based solutions (NbS) and biodiversity conservation, financing for biodiversity, technology enables biodiversity, mainstreaming SDGs and post 2020 biodiversity targets across business strategies, climate change and biodiversity and how energy and extractives industries support biodiversity targets.

China will hold the COP15 from October 11 to 24, the MEE announced in March. The meeting, to be held in Kunming, will review the "post-2020 global biodiversity framework."

Themed "Ecological Civilization: Building a Shared Future for All Life on Earth," the COP15 is the first global conference convened by the United Nations on the topic of ecological civilization.

(Cover image via VCG.)

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