Recommendation 15

We welcome the government’s recognition of the centrality of nature to tackling the climate crisis in its 2026 iteration of the ICF strategy. We also acknowledge the government’s intention to take a more integrated approach to nature spending going forward to ensure a more coherent offer to partner countries. However, we are concerned that in retreating from nature and forest sub-pledges the government risks: • removing the principal mechanism for meeting its legal obligations under the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and the Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF); • compromising partner countries’ trust in the CBD/GBF negotiation process; and 55 • its ability to secure buy-in on the climate and nature outcomes from countries that hold most of the world’s most critical ecosystems, which underpin UK security and prosperity. (Conclusion, Paragraph 65)