The BIO2020 event, that took place in the city of Sao Paulo (4-6 February 2020) gathered local and subnational leaders, stakeholders from academia, NGOs, the business community and technical experts from the biosphere reserves of Brazil with the objective of jointly creating a contribution that could feed the current negotiations on the post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework.

With support from the Post-2020 Biodiversity Framework – EU Support initiative and ICLEI South America, the Ministry of Infrastructure and Environmental Affairs (SIMA) hosted the event in preparation of the next meeting of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (COP15) that will take place in Kunming, China from the 15-28 October 2020. One of the main outcomes is the “Sao Paulo Letter”, a declaration that gathers the results of the working sessions and the ambitions of Brazil’s subnational and local governments towards biodiversity at a global scale.

According to its sixth national report, Brazil made great progress in Aichi Biodiversity Target (ABT) 19 related to scientific and technical knowledge on biodiversity, and also overachieved ABT 11 by protecting and conserving more than 17% of terrestrial and inland water areas and more than 10% of coastal and marine areas, however, local and subnational entities are ready to step up their participation and support their national government in achieving the new action targets that will be adopted in the new framework.

Local and subnational entities in Brazil have the potential to integrate global and national goals for biodiversity and to accelerate and deepening Brazil’s ability to achieve the post-2020 targets, which is of the key messages of the Sao Paulo Letter.

The BIO2020 event was a call for greater participation, recognition and encouragement of the actions implemented by subnational and local governments, as well as other players, a request that is relatable to all leading subnational authorities aiming to have a bigger impact on biodiversity-related decisions.

The outcomes and key messages from the event will be shared by the Advisory Committee on Subnational Governments coordinators, the Government of Québec and Regions4, at the second meeting of the Open-ended Working Group that is taking place in the city of Rome, Italy (24-28 February 2020) and that will be a milestone for subnational leadership as the COP15 and the negotiations on the new framework get closer.