Dispatch 2: COP17 Begins

Posted by on October 23, 2026

Yerevan has gone to great lengths to welcome the COP17 attendees to Armenia. Butterfly-themed art and posters can be found throughout the city, and even bus stops advertise the meeting in Armenian. The butterfly is the Yerevan blue (Polyommatus eriwanensis), an endangered species found only in Armenia. The COP17 logo displays the butterfly in 23 colors, one for each of the targets of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (more on this in a moment).

A butterfly sculpture stands in a city square.
A poster along a city sidewalk promotes the COP17 meeting in Yerevan, Armenia.
A butterfly sculpture on a city street in Yerevan, Armenia.
Butterflies — a symbol of the COP17 meeting — can be found all over the host city.

The conference officially opened with a ceremony on the evening of October 18, where Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan gave the welcome address. He described the meeting as a chance to channel global efforts toward tangible results, speed up implementation of existing commitments, and create new opportunities for cooperation. He stressed that only four years remain to reach the 2030 biodiversity targets, and he called on the world to “move from words to action.”

A large building is covered with banners displaying the COP17 logo and the words, "Taking action for nature."

The theme of taking action runs through the meeting program. The centerpiece of COP17 is the first Global Review of progress under the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (KMGBF). Adopted in 2022, the framework is the world’s shared plan to halt and reverse biodiversity loss; it sets 23 targets for 2030, including protecting 30% of lands and seas, ensuring wild species are used in a sustainable way, and reforming harmful economic subsidies. Unfortunately, the Global Review finds that the world is not on track to meet these targets.

Two related treaties are meeting alongside the CBD COP:

  • The Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, which governs the safe handling and movement of living organisms
  • The Nagoya Protocol on access and benefit-sharing, which deals with how the benefits of genetic resources are shared

Together, these three agreements – the KMGBF, the Cartagena Protocol, and the Nagoya Protocol – frame nearly everything here. Almost every session we’ve attended, from formal negotiations to side events, has touched on at least one of them.

In our next dispatch, we’ll share highlights from sessions our delegation has attended in the opening days of the COP17 meeting.

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