Late Sunday night, around 4 a.m. Montreal time, the Kunming-Montreal Agreement, or Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) for this decade, was adopted at COP15. COP15 President Huang Runqiu moved to adopt the agreement during the closing plenary along with a package of decisions relating to: a monitoring framework; planning, monitoring and review mechanisms; capacity building and technical cooperation initiatives; resource mobilisation; and digital sequencing information (DSI) of genetic resources.

COP15 is now in the thick of negotiations. Meanwhile, hundreds of people marched and protested in the streets of Montreal on Saturday, demanding an ambitious agreement to protect biodiversity. Let's take stock of some of the main issues being discussed at COP15.

COP15, the United Nations Conference on Biodiversity, begins today in Montreal. During the fifth session of preparatory negotiations, which ended on Monday, December 5, countries' divergent positions remained polarized on most issues and no significant progress was achieved. We cannot afford to exit COP15 without an ambitious and transformative agreement, with adequate economic resources to support it and mechanisms for implementation and monitoring.