Catalyzing transformative change for climate and biodiversity finance within COP policy discourses

Sara Löfqvist , Giacomo Delgado, Sophus O.S.E zu Ermgassen, Elodie Adam, Benjamin S. Thompson, Jayden Engert, Harrison Carter, Lily Xu, Jessica Smith, Irene Suárez Pérez, Siddarth Shrikanth, Carolina Bello, Pedro H. S. Brancalion, Ngonidzashe Chirinda, Daisy H. Dent, Katie Kedward, Omar R. Lopez, Nathalia Pérez-Cárdenas, Rachele Quaglino, Wulan Pusparini, Cesar Augusto Ruiz-Agudelo, Jocelyne S. Sze, Katharina Runge, Leland Werden, Puninda Thind

Recent outcomes of the Conferences of the Parties (COP) to the UNFCCC and CBD emphasize the need for transformative change to meet global climate and biodiversity targets. Yet climate and biodiversity finance discourses remains dominated by efforts to close ‘funding gaps’, with comparatively little attention to systemic drivers of climate change, nature loss, and social injustice. Here we analyze all UNFCCC COP decision reports between 1995 and 2025, encompassing approximately 1.1 million words of text across 30 reports, and show that finance language consistently focuses on funding mobilization over systemic reforms. We then outline a roadmap for how transformative change can be operationalized for climate and biodiversity finance policy in practice. Specifically, we explore the role of subsidy reforms, financial regulations, policy coherence, debt justice, and equitable access to finance. Together, these interventions can provide a foundation for advancing equitable, transformative change within climate and biodiversity finance policy.