In June, I attended the fourth edition of the World Biodiversity Forum (WBF) which was held at Davos, Switzerland. This conference is organized biennially by the University of Zurich together with a diverse steering committee, various partners and sponsors, and this year the event attracted more than 1150 participants from more than 70 countries. The forum has grown into one of the leading international platforms for biodiversity related dialogue, bringing together researchers, practitioners, representatives from indigenous people, governments, policymakers, businesses, artists, civil society, NGOs and philanthropies. The theme of this year’s event was “Leading Transformation Together”, which ran through the different sessions across five days. The central premise was that bending the curve of biodiversity loss and addressing the wider, interconnected crises affecting planetary health and social justice, require actionable solutions built jointly across sectors and generations, not only from any single discipline or institution acting alone. Much of the programme also connected directly to the operationalization of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (KM- GBF), with the event culminating in the adoption of a resolution calling for stronger application of science, policies, improved biodiversity monitoring, and increased investment in the research infrastructure needed to support evidence based decisions. The WBF2026 community expressed deep concern that despite improved reporting under the KM-GBF, major gaps in implementation still persist. The drivers of biodiversity loss are being intensified alarmingly by attacks on multilateralism and escalating armed conflicts. It was also discussed that these interlinked crises also open opportunities to phase out economic and social models that are recognized as unsustainable and replace them with more representative governance, renewed visions and actions. The central call of the WBF2026 resolution was to move from commitment to implementation: transforming society’s relationship with biodiversity by 2030 and living in harmony with nature by 2050. The resolution’s three recommendations to all relevant parties were:
Stand for biodiversity and acknowledge nature’s contributions: recognize nature’s contributions to people and economies and the systemic risks of biodiversity loss, learn from Indigenous Peoples and local communities, and speak and act for biodiversity wherever you operate.
Co-create diverse visions for biodiverse futures: collaborate across sectors on inclusive, science informed visions that respect plural values and recognize differing capacities and historical responsibilities.
Lead transformative change toward desirable futures: reexamine business as usual paradigms, particularly in wealthy societies, and act now through cities, regions, businesses, scientists and civil society rather than waiting for international agreements alone. The keynote speeches, discussions, oral and poster presentations provided the opportunity for peer support and to learn and understand new perspectives from others who are working with biodiversity and struggling with similar challenges. Since participants were from various fields they provided diverse perspectives and experiences from different disciplines, cultures and social contexts. This got me motivated to deepen my understanding of the topics and in building collaboration. LUT Group Confidential – Other information (3Y) There were 14 oral presentation sessions running in parallel across four days, alongside two days of workshop and poster presentation. The scale of the event took me by surprise. I quickly gave up any thought of attending all the sessions, instead I followed the sessions that piqued my interest and those which were closely related to my field of research. The themes of the sessions comprised current trends and high priority topics related to biodiversity which included 10 different thematic tracks covering ecosystem functioning, biodiversity measurements, indicators and impact metric, biodiversity nexus, future of biodiversity, biodiversity related finance and economic risks, legislation and policies, achieving KM-GBF goals and targets, reconnecting with nature and indigenous people, connecting science, society and practice, and representing biodiversity through arts and culture. The resolution’s appendix maps the trends running through the sessions and WBF2026 community: a shift toward nexus and systems thinking across biodiversity, climate, food, water and health; growing attention to plural values and environmental justice; and the use of narratives, arts and Living Labs to engage society. Technically, it points to eDNA, remote sensing and AI transforming biodiversity monitoring, and to the fast growth of biodiversity footprinting, disclosure standards and nature-positive finance in support of KM-GBF implementation. A few moments stood out for me from the conference:
Keynotes from David Boyd and Lyla June which were both informative and inspiring: David Boyd spoke about conserving biodiversity by using the rights based approaches, where working with representatives of law and implementation of legal tools can be used to reduce biodiversity loss. While Lyla June spoke about the historical practices of indigenous people and how they have always tried to be part of the nature and not isolated from it. She called for humans to take up responsibility for our ecosystems and conserve biodiversity, as there are certain things that only humans can achieve for the land that no other species can do. Between them they made the case that biodiversity is not only a scientific problem but a question of rights, relationships and worldview.
A session on “Quantifying Biodiversity Impacts of Global Production, Trade and Consumption”, where advancements in the methods and approaches to quantify the impacts on biodiversity was discussed. This was closely related to my research.
“Advanced farmland biodiversity monitoring session” that looked into how farmland biodiversity monitoring is moving from indicators into practice, spanning digital monitoring, in-situ soil monitoring, their applications and challenges in agri- environmental scheme, biodiversity metrics in agricultural supply chains.
Display of “BLUEGREENS” box, which was a demonstration of the biodiversity based food production solutions, where they try and transpose local river ecosystem in an upscaled shipping container.
The forum’s art programme: the exhibitions at the venue along with the musical performances. During the ice breaker session, there was a call to collaborate and express biodiversity science through art. It was stated that “We need arts to embed science into society, facts alone do not reach the public. We need the capacity to feel the facts, to be moved by them in ways that inspire action, because facts alone don’t move people and policy; emotions do.” LUT Group Confidential – Other information (3Y)
A panel discussion by the presenters of the session “Biodiversity Finance and Economics: Metrics, Markets, and Private Capital”, where the panelists argued that biodiversity has not delivered for markets in the way climate change has, and that people should accept investors putting profits ahead of biodiversity if that is what attracts capital in the first place. Whether or not one agrees, the framing itself is worth sitting with. This made me think, if these are the terms on which biodiversity currently enters financial decision making, then we still have a long way to go.
Several other individual presentations left an impression, some of them are: oral presentations on IPBES report chapter “Approaches for measurement of business dependencies and impacts on biodiversity” and “The proposal of doughnut framework for biodiversity with threats and values”. Workshop on “Defining Research and Policy Priorities for Building Sustainable and Biodiverse Agroecosystems”, poster on “Monitoring genetic diversity indicators with the help of earth observation data”. At the event, I had the pleasure of presenting my own poster related to my research (Lucky enough, since the poster had earlier taken an unplanned swim in Lake Zurich and I very nearly lost it). The poster was titled “Menu of Extinction: Quantifying Biodiversity Footprint of Different Diets Using Life Cycle Assessment (LCA)”. It was about how the food choices we make as individuals translate into the pressure on ecosystems, and how those impacts can actually be measured. The study involved life cycle assessment of food meals and ranking them based on their impacts on biodiversity to provide evidence based information to the stakeholders to make conscientious decision on their food choices that could be biodiversity friendly. Participation in WBF2026 provided me with unique opportunities to network with the people (researchers, representatives from companies, and others) who are working in the same field as mine and that are closely related to the field, otherwise which would not have been possible. It gave me great exposure to the latest research, new publications and initiatives, and the progress made around the world. The event also offered an excellent opportunity to showcase my own work and publicize the work that our research group is carrying out, also to expand our research by building a strong international network with other researcher groups and companies. I returned from WBF2026 with new ideas for my research and a stronger sense of belonging to the community I work in. Meeting people in person and talking things through builds a kind of strong network and work relationship that email rarely does, and this conference made that possible. I am very grateful to Future Earth Suomi (FES) for providing the travel fund for my participation in WBF2026.
Mahendra Veerappa LUT