Africa’s $7.6 Trillion Nature Wealth Faces a Funding Test as Biodiversity Loss Deepens

Multilateral development banks and development partners can help countries strengthen policies and institutions, raise more funding and redirect subsidies that damage nature.

Africa's forests, grasslands and wildlife support livelihoods, sustain economies and help regulate the planet's climate. The continent's natural capital has been valued at $7.6 trillion by the African Development Bank Group's African Natural Resources Management and Investment Centre, but that extraordinary wealth has not translated into sustainable prosperity for many of the people who depend on it.

This gap will come into focus at the 17th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity, or CBD COP17, taking place in Yerevan, Armenia, from 19–30 October 2026. The African Development Bank Group will join governments, development partners, businesses and civil society to advance biodiversity finance and growth that protects and restores nature.

Enormous Natural Wealth Is Under Growing Pressure

Africa holds about a quarter of global biodiversity and nine of the world's 36 recognised biodiversity hotspots. Forests and grasslands cover more than half its land area and sustain the livelihoods of over 70% of people in sub-Saharan Africa, making healthy ecosystems an everyday economic necessity. The Congo Basin, the world's second-largest rainforest, is also one of the planet's most important carbon sinks. Its protection carries consequences far beyond the continent.

Africa loses close to four million hectares of forest each year, with Côte d'Ivoire, Ghana and the Democratic Republic of Congo among the countries experiencing significant losses. WWF's Living Planet Report 2024 found that Africa's monitored vertebrate wildlife populations fell by 76% between 1970 and 2020.

These losses sit within a global biodiversity crisis, as declining ecosystems reduce the natural resources and services that societies and economies rely on. Africa faces particular pressure because its exposure to nature-related risks is high and access to biodiversity finance remains limited.

Biodiversity Plans Need a Place in National Budgets

The Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, adopted in 2022, commits countries to conserve and manage at least 30% of land and marine ecosystems by 2030. Governments across Africa have begun developing National Biodiversity Strategies and Action Plans to bring those global commitments into national decision-making.

The harder task is giving these plans enough financial and political weight to shape investment, public spending and resource mobilisation. A biodiversity strategy needs to influence decisions across the economy if it is to protect the natural assets on which development depends.

Persistent underfunding, weak institutions and competing short-term priorities make implementation difficult. Biodiversity also remains on the margins of development planning in many cases, limiting its influence over budgets and sectoral investments.

Multilateral development banks and development partners can help countries strengthen policies and institutions, raise more funding and redirect subsidies that damage nature. Financing instruments that attract concessional funding and private capital can help move projects from national plans into implementation.

Treating biodiversity as an economic asset gives governments a stronger basis for making those choices, connecting ecosystem protection with livelihoods, resilience and inclusive growth.

COP17 Brings Investment Commitments Into Focus

The Yerevan conference offers an opportunity to put biodiversity closer to the centre of Africa's economic agenda and build partnerships that can finance practical action.

The African Development Bank Group is already investing in ecosystem restoration, landscape resilience, forest conservation and sustainable natural resource management. Its commitments include $6.5 billion for the Great Green Wall Initiative, alongside programmes across the Congo Basin, Lake Chad Basin, Horn of Africa and the wider Sahel.

These investments address the central challenge facing the continent: protecting natural wealth requires sustained funding, capable institutions and projects that deliver benefits people can see in their lives. For Africa, progress at COP17 will depend on whether biodiversity commitments lead to investment at sufficient scale, giving countries the means to restore ecosystems and make their natural wealth a stronger foundation for resilient development.