Impact of the Convention on Biological Diversity 1992 on Global Biodiversity Conservation

Before 1992, genetic resources from biodiversity-rich nations – plants, microorganisms, traditional medicinal knowledge – were largely treated as the “common heritage of mankind.” In practice, this meant companies and researchers from developed nations could freely access these resources, develop commercial products, and patent them, often without any acknowledgment or compensation to the communities or countries that had nurtured this knowledge for generations. The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), adopted at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro on 5 June 1992, fundamentally changed this equation. It is one of the most significant international environmental agreements ever negotiated – and for a country like India, with its extraordinary biological wealth, understanding it is essential.

What is the Convention on Biological Diversity? 🔗

The CBD is a multilateral treaty under the United Nations that entered into force on 29 December 1993. It was opened for signature at the Rio Earth Summit alongside other landmark agreements, reflecting a global consensus that biodiversity loss was no longer just an environmental concern – it was a development and justice issue. The Convention has three main goals: the conservation of biological diversity, the sustainable use of its components, and the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from genetic resources. As of today, there are 193 parties to the Convention , making it one of the most widely ratified environmental treaties in history. The United States remains a notable exception, having declined to ratify the CBD due to concerns over intellectual property rights, technology transfer, and finance provisions.

The Convention recognized for the first time in international law that the conservation of biodiversity is “a common concern of humankind” and is an integral part of the development process. That phrase – “common concern” rather than “common heritage” – was a deliberate and consequential shift. It preserved each nation’s sovereign control over its biological resources while establishing a shared global responsibility for conservation.

The three core objectives explained 🔗

Conservation of biological diversity 🔗

The first objective requires parties to actively protect ecosystems, species, and genetic diversity within their territories. Parties are obligated to inventory and monitor biodiversity, incorporate the concepts of conservation and sustainable development into national strategies and economic development, and preserve indigenous conservation practices. The CBD covers biodiversity at every level – from genetic variation within species to entire ecosystems – making it far more comprehensive than earlier treaties that focused narrowly on endangered species or specific habitats.

The Convention emphasizes both in-situ conservation (protecting species within their natural habitats, such as through national parks and wildlife sanctuaries) and ex-situ conservation (protecting species outside their natural habitats, such as through seed banks and botanical gardens). For India, which is one of the world’s 17 megadiverse countries, this obligation translates into maintaining its extensive network of protected areas as well as community conservation efforts across its forests, wetlands, and coastal ecosystems.

Sustainable use of biological components 🔗

Biological diversity use may take place in the sense of the CBD only according to sustainable principals, which interconnect ecological, economic, social and political interests. The Convention does not prohibit the use of biological resources – it regulates how they are used. Ecosystems, species and genetic resources should be used for the benefit of humans, but in a way that does not lead to the decline of biodiversity. This is operationalized through what the CBD calls the “Ecosystem Approach,” which treats human communities as part of – not apart from – ecosystems, and guides resource use decisions accordingly.

Fair and equitable benefit sharing 🔗

This is arguably the most transformative and contested objective of the CBD. Prior to 1992, genetic resources were tagged as common heritage belonging to the public domain. The CBD overturned this. The CBD specifies that access to biological diversity must be accompanied with the principle of fair “benefit sharing.” According to the CBD, fair benefit-sharing means that all countries and/or affected local groups receive financial reimbursement for providing access to their genetic resources or traditional knowledge for use by international participants. This provision directly targeted the practice of biopiracy – the unauthorized use of biological resources and traditional knowledge by corporations and researchers, without compensating the source communities.

National sovereignty over biological resources 🔗

One of the CBD’s most significant legal innovations was affirming that nations hold sovereign rights over their biological resources. The CBD recognizes the sovereignty of countries over their biological resources and their authority to determine access to genetic resources through national legislation. This gave developing nations – which are disproportionately home to the world’s biodiversity – the legal footing to negotiate the terms of access rather than having their resources used freely.

Recognizing the sovereign rights of states to use their own biological resources, the Convention expects the parties to facilitate access to genetic resources by other parties subject to national legislation and on mutually agreed terms. In other words, access is not blocked – but it must be negotiated, documented, and accompanied by agreed benefit-sharing arrangements. This framework directly shaped how India approached the question of protecting its biological wealth and traditional knowledge from external exploitation.

India’s ratification and legislative response 🔗

India signed the Convention on Biological Diversity at Rio de Janeiro on 5 June 1992, and ratified it on 18 February 1994. As one of the early nations to legislate on this issue, the Biological Diversity (BD) Act was drafted and enacted in 2002 with the main purpose of ensuring legal implementation of the CBD provisions.

The Act sought to achieve multiple objectives simultaneously: safeguarding India’s sovereign rights over its biological resources, regulating access to these resources, protecting traditional knowledge, and ensuring benefit-sharing with local communities. It established a three-tiered institutional structure: the National Biodiversity Authority (NBA) at the national level, State Biodiversity Boards (SBBs) at the state level, and Biodiversity Management Committees (BMCs) at the local/panchayat level. This decentralized structure was designed to ensure that communities closest to the biological resources also had a meaningful role in governing them.

The BD Act was hailed as an important step towards preserving India’s vast biodiversity and was considered a pioneer legislation as it recognised the sovereign right of countries over their natural resources. Only 105 of 197 countries that signed the CBD enacted a national legislation for regulatory use of bio-resources, making India an early mover among megadiverse nations.

The supplementary protocols: Cartagena and Nagoya 🔗

The CBD’s three objectives are elaborated and operationalized through two major supplementary protocols.

The Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety (2000) 🔗

The Cartagena Protocol, adopted in 2000, focuses on biosafety. It emphasizes the safe handling, transfer, and use of living modified organisms (LMOs) resulting from modern biotechnology, ensuring they do not adversely affect biological diversity or human health. It introduced the Advance Informed Agreement (AIA) procedure, which requires that countries receiving LMOs be informed in advance and give consent before such organisms cross their borders. The Protocol entered into force in 2003 and applies a precautionary approach – meaning countries can restrict imports of LMOs even in the absence of complete scientific certainty about the risks.

The Nagoya Protocol on Access and Benefit Sharing (2010) 🔗

The Nagoya Protocol on Access to Genetic Resources and the Fair and Equitable Sharing of Benefits Arising from their Utilization is a 2010 supplementary agreement to the CBD. Its aim is the implementation of one of the three objectives of the CBD: the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising out of the utilization of genetic resources. It was adopted on 29 October 2010 in Nagoya, Japan, at the 10th Conference of Parties (COP10) and came into force on 12 October 2014, establishing a global legal framework for access to genetic resources and fair and equitable sharing of benefits.

A central mechanism of the Nagoya Protocol is Prior Informed Consent (PIC) – before accessing genetic resources or associated traditional knowledge, users must obtain explicit consent from the country of origin and, where applicable, from local communities. This is paired with Mutually Agreed Terms (MAT), which are the negotiated conditions under which access is granted and benefits will be shared. The protocol was developed in response to rising global concerns over biopiracy, the exploitation of genetic resources and associated traditional knowledge without proper acknowledgment or compensation.

For India, the Nagoya Protocol was particularly relevant. India signed and ratified the Protocol, aligning it with the Biological Diversity Act, 2002 to formalize Access and Benefit-Sharing (ABS) mechanisms. The government followed this up by issuing the Access to Biological Resources and Associated Knowledge and Benefit Sharing Regulations, 2014 to put operational procedures in place.

CBD’s broader impact on global biodiversity governance 🔗

Beyond creating legal obligations, the CBD reshaped how biodiversity is understood in policy terms. The 193 parties to the Convention unequivocally state that biodiversity must be recognized as the foundation of economic productivity, prosperity and sustainable development, and must be backed with new and original economic regulations and governance. This shift encouraged governments to move toward integrating biodiversity into national accounting systems and economic planning, not just conservation programs.

The CBD’s Conference of Parties (COP) – which meets periodically to review progress and set new targets – has been the primary forum for translating these commitments into action. Under the Aichi Biodiversity Targets (2010-2020), the CBD catalysed the creation and expansion of protected areas worldwide. About 15 percent of terrestrial areas and 7 percent of marine areas were protected, an increase from previous decades. At COP15 held in Montreal in December 2022, parties adopted the landmark Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, which set the ambitious 30×30 target – protecting 30% of land and ocean by 2030.

Challenges and continuing debates 🔗

Despite its achievements, the CBD framework faces real and ongoing tensions. The most prominent current debate is around Digital Sequence Information (DSI) – the digitized genetic data derived from biological resources. As biotechnology advances, researchers can now extract and use genetic information in digital form without physically accessing the biological material. This creates a potential loophole: companies could use DSI to develop commercial products and yet argue they never “accessed” a genetic resource under the CBD framework. Whether DSI signals a new wave of digital biopiracy or the start of a new open-source revolution in the engineering of life remains the subject of fierce debate.

There is also an ongoing tension between developed and developing nations. A major snag of the CBD was a shift in focus from the ecological and scientific value of biodiversity to its commercial value. Developing countries’ strategy was to check corporate patenting, control the germplasm and ensure equitable sharing of benefits from commercial use in biotechnology, pharma and seed industries. Whether the CBD’s ABS framework has adequately delivered on benefit-sharing commitments for source communities remains a contested question.

At the national level, India too has seen debates. The Biological Diversity (Amendment) Act, 2023 introduced changes that critics argue weaken community rights and conservation oversight, while proponents contend they reduce unnecessary regulatory burden. These tensions reflect a broader difficulty: balancing the commercial potential of biodiversity with the rights of local communities and the imperative of conservation.

What do you think? Given that the CBD affirms national sovereignty over biological resources, do you think the current benefit-sharing frameworks adequately protect the rights of local and indigenous communities – or does sovereignty primarily serve state interests over community interests? And as digital sequencing increasingly allows genetic data to be extracted without physically accessing biological material, how should international law evolve to close this emerging loophole in biopiracy regulation?

References

1. https://www.cbd.int/convention
2. https://www.un.org/en/observances/biological-diversity-day/convention
3. https://abs.nls.ac.in/?page_id=219
4. https://lawblend.com/articles/biodiversity-conservation-act-in-india/