NBSAP Process Project

Processes of development and implementation of National Biodiversity Strategies and Action Plans (NBSAPs) are as important as the final NBSAP documents. There is a great wealth of experience in numerous countries on how key stakeholders have been engaged, how key policy makers have been convinced, how national budget financing has been captured, and more. These processes are not typically well documented in NBSAPs or in national reports, although some have been captured in case studies and workshop reports.

The Documentation of NBSAP Development and Revision Processes project was initiated to increase critical reflection on, and to improve the process of NBSAP development and revision as it took place in different countries in accordance with COP decision X/2 and Aichi Biodiversity Target 17. This “process” experience is invaluable for other countries facing similar challenges and so, a regionally representative set of national processes was documented, and the results of an aggregate analysis were disseminated.

Researchers from 10 participating countries were commissioned to prepare monographs that documented and analyzed the NBSAP revision process in their countries. The researchers also participated in a workshop, held in Bangkok, Thailand on 16 and 17 July 2014, to share their experiences and reflections midway through the project. Participating countries included Antigua and Barbuda, Bhutan, Burkina Faso, Colombia, Fiji, Georgia, Guatemala, Iraq, Namibia, and the Philippines.

The project was coordinated by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN). They prepared the Societal participatory processes in the revision of National Biodiversity Strategies and Action Plans (NBSAPs) report that was presented to the twelfth meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (COP12) as an information document (UNEP/CBD/COP/12/INF/38) and a final report on the project, published in January 2015. 

Results and recommendations were presented at the first side event of its kind during COP12, held in Pyeongchang, Republic of Korea.