COP17: Nature knows no boundaries – neither can our solutions

As local government leaders from around the world, we represent communities that may appear worlds apart. Yet, we are confronting different expressions of the same challenge: protecting the natural systems our people depend on, while also building livelihoods that are resilient to a changing climate.

We are all members of Coastal 500, which brings together local government leaders whose communities depend on healthy coastal waters. As the international community prepares for two of the UN’s major annual conferences, this month’s biodiversity crisis summit in Yerevan, Armenia, and the climate change talks in Antalya, Türkiye next month, we urge policymakers, governments and funders to back solutions that bridge these two global agendas. Too often, they are treated separately.

Global commitments on biodiversity and climate are made in conference halls, but their success ultimately depends on what happens in communities like ours. It is local leaders who balance conservation with livelihoods; we translate national ambitions into decisions about land and water, and we work with farmers, fishers and families to build resilience. From agricultural landscapes to coastal communities around the world, we have learned that these challenges cannot be solved one ecosystem, or one community, at a time.

Connected systems need connected solutions

Our communities know we cannot protect the sea without protecting the land and water that feed into it. What happens upstream does not stay upstream. Soil lost from a farm enters streams that lead to rivers that carry sediment, nutrients, waste and pollution across municipal boundaries. They flow into wetlands, estuaries and coastal waters. By contrast, healthy soils, forests and wetlands retain water, reduce erosion and flooding, and help sustain downstream ecosystems and communities.

What happens upstream does not stay upstream: the meeting point between the Tatuamunha River and the Atlantic Ocean, eastern Brazil (Luciano Candisani / Minden Pictures / Alamy)

Those connections continue at the coast.

Mangroves protect communities from erosion and storms. Reefs dissipate wave energy and sustain fisheries. Seagrass beds and estuaries provide nursery habitats, improve water quality and store carbon. A watershed is not a collection of separate environments or problems; it is a living system.

For those of us in local government, these connections are not abstract. In Honduras, we are working with the NGO Rare to pilot an approach that connects coastal fisheries management with the health of the watersheds and landscapes that feed those waters. For example, mayors from Honduras met with representatives of Rare Colombia to exchange information and ideas on integrating the governance of fisheries and farms. This informed an initiative in Honduras to integrate a land-sea solution for fishing and farming. Linking regenerative agriculture, sustainable land use and freshwater management with healthy reefs, fisheries and coastal livelihoods is one way to manage resilience across ecosystems.

Healthy waters, healthy communities

That same principle of recognising interconnected systems underpins our networks.

Connecting these networks creates an opportunity to take local learnings further: a municipality reducing agricultural runoff can share lessons with coastal leaders confronting its downstream effects; experience building community participation around fisheries can inform the governance of other shared resources, such as rivers and other waterways. The solutions will not look identical across Indonesia, Colombia, Honduras, Palau and Brazil, but local leaders face common challenges. They can adapt approaches that have worked elsewhere to their own ecological, cultural and institutional contexts.

That is the power of networks. They allow solutions and lessons to travel across borders, watersheds and ecosystems, rather than requiring every municipality to start from scratch.

Think locally to deliver globally

Local governments shape many of the decisions that determine whether conservation and climate resilience plans succeed — from land and coastal use to water management, infrastructure and disaster preparedness. We work directly with the people who manage and depend on these resources.

Yet too often we are expected to deliver on global commitments without sufficient authority, finance or representation.

National governments, donors and negotiators must change that. Local governments and communities need a meaningful role in national biodiversity and climate plans, and better access to finance. There needs to be stronger recognition for community rights and co-management, too. Investment should also enable cooperation across jurisdictions, reflecting how ecosystems function rather than treating individual projects or protected areas as islands.

And we should measure what matters. For example, conserving 30% of the planet by 2030, which will be discussed in Yerevan, is an important goal. But success is more than a line on a map. Success will look like connected, functioning ecosystems that sustain livelihoods, reduce climate risks and leave local communities better equipped to manage the resources on which they depend.

A resilient community is not one protected from nature. It is one where forests hold water, rivers run clean and wetlands have room to function. The reefs are alive, the mangroves are standing, and livelihoods are secure. In resilient communities, rights are respected, collaboration is vibrant and local institutions are strong.

Between Yerevan and Antalya, the world has an opportunity to connect two agendas that nature never separated: protecting the natural systems and building resilient livelihoods.