The next time someone asks you what biodiversity is, try this: "It's about your life, life on this planet, and about what we're doing to this planet with our eyes open."
So said United Nations Environment Program Executive Director Achim Steiner on Monday, Oct. 18 at the opening of a U.N. meeting that has brought representatives from 193 countries to Nagoya this week and next to work out a new plan to halt the sixth great extinction event in the history of the Earth (and the only one caused by humans).
Delegates to the 10th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), or COP10 for short, also aim to sign off on a deal to ensure that the benefits of biodiversity are shared fairly — and agree on who's going to pay for it all.