The 2020 UN Biodiversity Conference was originally scheduled to take place in Kunming, China, in October 2020. But, like most multilateral meetings in 2020, the conference was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) still needed its parties to convene to pass an interim budget for 2021 since the current budget for the Secretariat runs out on 31 December 2020 and there is a pressing need to keep the Secretariat operating and enable parties to pay their dues in 2021.
Thus, the second extraordinary meeting of the CBD Conference of the Parties (ExCOP 2), the first extraordinary meeting of the Conference of the Parties serving as the Meeting of the Parties to the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety (CP ExCOP/MOP 1) and the first extraordinary meeting of the Conference of the Parties serving as the Meeting of the Parties to the Nagoya Protocol on Access to Genetic Resources and the Fair and Equitable Sharing of Benefits Arising from their Utilization (NP ExCOP/MOP 1) convened in a virtual setting.
The meeting was formally opened on Monday, 16 November 2020, by the presentation of the draft budget. Parties were given 72 hours to raise any objections in writing. If no objections were raised, the budget would be considered adopted. On Thursday, 19 November 2020, COP 14 President Yasmine Fouad, Minister of Environment, Egypt, announced a brief suspension of the meeting until 25 November 2020 for further consultations among parties to resolve a written objection. After another 48-hour “silence procedure,” on Friday, 27 November 2020, President Fouad announced the successful adoption of the budget and closed the ExCOP by written communication.
The Earth Negotiations Bulletin (ENB) summary and analysis of this meeting is available in HTML and PDF format.