On December 29, 1993 C.E., a treaty unlike any before it became binding international law. The Convention on Biological Diversity committed nations across the globe to a shared responsibility: protecting the living systems that make human life possible. It was the first time international law had formally declared that conserving biodiversity is “a common concern of humankind.”
Key facts
- Biodiversity convention: The CBD was opened for signature at the Rio Earth Summit on June 5, 1992 C.E., and collected 168 signatures before its closing date in June 1993 C.E. — the largest sign-on to any environmental treaty at that point.
- Biological diversity: The treaty covers all ecosystems, species, and genetic resources, linking traditional conservation goals to the economic principle of sustainable use — and making both legally binding on ratifying nations.
- Genetic resource sharing: A third pillar of the treaty — the fair and equitable sharing of benefits from genetic resources, particularly those used commercially — was a landmark acknowledgment of the rights of source communities and sovereign states over their own biological heritage.
How the biodiversity convention came to be
The idea had been building for years before the ink dried in Rio. In November 1988 C.E., a United Nations Environment Programme working group first proposed a binding international framework for biodiversity. Three years of technical drafts and intergovernmental negotiations followed.
A final conference in Nairobi, Kenya, in 1992 C.E. distilled the agreed text into what became known as the Nairobi Final Act. From there, the Convention was carried to the Earth Summit — the largest gathering of world leaders in history at the time — where it was opened to the world.
The political moment mattered. The Earth Summit brought together heads of state, Indigenous representatives, scientists, and civil society from nearly every nation. The biodiversity treaty sat alongside the Framework Convention on Climate Change as a signal that the international community was ready to treat the health of the planet as a shared obligation rather than a national afterthought.
Three goals, one framework
The CBD rests on three pillars. The first is the conservation of biological diversity itself — protecting ecosystems, species, and genes from preventable loss. The second is the sustainable use of biological resources, rejecting the idea that protection and human need are incompatible. The third, and most novel, is the equitable sharing of benefits derived from genetic resources.
That third pillar broke new ground. For generations, biodiversity-rich regions — many of them in the Global South — had seen their biological heritage extracted and commercialized without compensation or credit. The CBD said that had to change. Countries and local communities, including many Indigenous peoples, hold sovereign rights over their genetic resources.
The treaty also introduced the precautionary principle into international environmental law: if there is a credible threat to biodiversity, scientific uncertainty is not sufficient grounds for inaction. That principle has since shaped environmental policy far beyond the Convention’s own scope.
Lasting impact
The CBD created infrastructure that has shaped global conservation for three decades. Its Conference of the Parties — now in its 16th gathering, held in Cali, Colombia, in 2024 C.E. — remains the primary forum where nations negotiate biodiversity commitments. Two supplementary protocols extended the framework: the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, adopted in 2000 C.E. to govern the movement of genetically modified organisms across borders, and the Nagoya Protocol, adopted in 2010 C.E. to operationalize the fair and equitable sharing of genetic resource benefits.
The CBD Secretariat, based in Montreal, Canada, coordinates implementation, tracks national progress, and connects scientific expertise with policy. The Subsidiary Body on Scientific, Technical and Technological Advice provides rigorous scientific assessment to guide decisions — a model later echoed in the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services.
The Convention also shaped how nations think about biodiversity beyond their own borders. Its work identifying Ecologically or Biologically Significant Marine Areas has fed directly into negotiations for the High Seas Treaty, an effort to extend biodiversity protection into international waters where no single nation holds jurisdiction.
Perhaps most durably, the CBD shifted the vocabulary of conservation. Before 1993 C.E., protecting nature was largely understood as saving charismatic species or setting aside wilderness. After the Convention, biological diversity — the full web of genes, species, and ecosystems — became the unit of concern.
Blindspots and limits
The CBD’s record is uneven. The Aichi Biodiversity Targets, 20 goals set for 2011 C.E. to 2020 C.E., were largely not met — hampered by weak measurement systems, underfunding, and the low political priority given to biodiversity compared to agriculture and economic growth. The Convention also has a notable gap: the United States is the only UN member state that has signed but never ratified the treaty, limiting both its diplomatic reach and its funding base. Implementation has varied enormously across nations, and the gap between formal commitments and on-the-ground outcomes remains one of the central challenges in global conservation.
The CBD’s framework also struggled for years to give meaningful weight to Indigenous and local communities whose land stewardship has been among the most effective forms of biodiversity conservation on Earth. Recent agreements have moved toward recognizing Indigenous territorial rights more explicitly, but the implementation gap persists.
Read more
For more on this story, see: Convention on Biological Diversity — Wikipedia
For more from Good News for Humankind, see:
- Ghana establishes a major marine protected area at Cape Three Points
- Indigenous land rights milestone: 160 million hectares recognized ahead of COP30
- The Good News for Humankind archive on the modern era
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