Landmark UN biodiversity fund has raised just $7,085 of hoped-for billions

The Cali Fund — the UN’s flagship scheme to make companies pay for profiting from nature’s genetic data — has collected just US$7,085 since its launch, according to AFP reporting.

Adopted at the COP16 biodiversity summit in Cali, Colombia, at the end of 2024 and operating since February 2025, the fund was meant to raise billions for nature protection. Its designers suggested it could recover about US$1 billion a year, by asking pharmaceutical, cosmetics, biotechnology and animal/plant-breeding companies to pay 1% of annual profits — or 0.1% of turnover — linked to digital sequence information (DSI): genetic data from plants, animals, fungi and other organisms that is freely accessible in digital databases.

So far only three companies have paid in: Britain’s TierraViva AI (US$1,000) and Prozomix (US$5,000), and Belgium’s E-BIOM (US$1,085). Two others have pledged a further US$3,571.

The problem, analysts say, is that the fund is voluntary and not legally binding. Juliette Landry of the Paris-based think tank IDDRI told AFP that companies ask why they should contribute when competitors do not; Pakhi Das of the NGO Plant-for-the-Planet said no country has legislation incentivising contributions. Companies also want safeguards on how the money is spent, said Vishaish Uppal of WWF-India, and for the fund’s internationally accepted payment certificates to be recognised nationally so they are not charged twice.

A UN biodiversity summit in Armenia, running until October 30, is now discussing the fund’s future.

Sources: AFP reporting via Dawn (https://www.dawn.com/news/2038697/landmark-biodiversity-fund-collapses-with-just-7085-raised) and Gulf Today (https://www.gulftoday.ae/lifestyle/2026/10/20/why-is-landmark-un-biodiversity-fund-nearly-empty)