Decision 15/8 on Capacity-building and development and technical and scientific cooperation invites universities and other academic institutions to support the Kunming-Montréal Global Biodiversity Framework. Subsequently, the support of academia has been requested and encouraged in recommendations made at SBSTTA 25 and 26 and SBI 4. CoP 16 agenda items 8, 10, 12, 16, at least, all have prominent roles for academic institutions, as do the issue-focussed agenda items 18-25. Engaging consistently and meaningfully with academic institutions in support of the Convention has, however, proved challenging. The Conservation And Sustainability Consortium of AcaDEmic institutions (CASCADE) has been established to respond to this need. CASCADE initially brought together higher education institutions from across the UK working on finding sustainable and socially just responses to biodiversity loss.

CASCADE members work at the intersection of biodiversity conservation, policy, and international development in ODA-eligible countries, and share a strong commitment to international knowledge exchange, technical and scientific cooperation, and capability-building for future generations of conservation scientists. Given the central role of academic institutions to support the implementation of the Kunming-Montréal Global Biodiversity Framework at local, national and global scales, CASCADE is now forming links with academic institutions and networks in other countries and regions, and with scientific and technical support centres established to support the implementation of the Kunming-Montréal Global Biodiversity Framework.  Our aspiration is to work with our academic colleagues overseas to share experiences and insights from our project, to enable North-South and South-South collaboration through our network, and to scale up knowledge exchange, scientific cooperation, and capability-building for the Kunming-Montréal Global Biodiversity Framework worldwide.

The side event will:

1. provide an overview CASCADE’s current structure and capability, highlighting transnational collaborations and partnerships and indicating how it aligns with identified needs and current Kunming-Montréal Global Biodiversity Framework support structures;
2. hear from a panel of Parties on their perspectives on greater engagement with academia (aspirations, challenges and opportunities);
3. present drafts of CASCADE’s first outputs, which will be opened for consultation. These are an assessment of behaviour change in the context of the Kunming-Montréal Global Biodiversity Framework and a proposal for a binary indicator for Target 5: and
4. conclude with a discussion on priorities and ways forward.