UNEP representatives will be participating in the following events at Ramsar COP15.
Time zone: GMT+2
📅 24 July | 🕒 13:30 hrs | 📍 Gwayi Room
From Ramsar to 2026: Water as an Organizing Principle
The High-Level Roundtable will bring together key stakeholders working across four of the MEAs – the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), the Convention on Wetlands (Ramsar), the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Participants will explore how water cuts across those frameworks and discuss how centering water as an organizing principle would aid each in their efforts to advance their mutually reinforcing mandates.
📅 25 July | 🕒 18:30 hrs | 📍 Gwayi Room
Youth Leadership and the Future of the Convention on Wetlands
This side event aims to showcase the progress made since the adoption of the first youth resolution at COP14, and to identify key areas that still require action to fully implement the resolution. A persistent challenge for Contracting Parties is how to meaningfully ‘seek, welcome and reflect on’ diverse youth voices in wetland priorities, policies and programmes. This session will directly address that challenge through practical, youth-partnered examples.
📅 27 July | 🕒 13:30 hrs | 📍 Kalala Room
Earth Observation for Wetlands Inventory, Assessment and Monitoring
This event will highlight key recommendations from the Earth Observation Consultation, provide an update on progress since the Earth Observation Day organised in December 2024 by the Ramsar Secretariat and Scientific and Technical Review Panel, and engage participants in shaping the implementation and governance of GEO-Wetlands. It will also explore partnership opportunities with Space Agencies, regional initiatives, and civil society actors.
📅 28 July | 🕒 18:30 hrs | 📍 Kazuma Room
Ramsar Online Reporting System: Reflection, Upgrade and Link to the DaRT Tool
The objective of the event is to reflect on the use of the Online Reporting System (ORS) for the Ramsar Convention and other relevant conventions over the past decade, present the modernized ORS launched in October 2024, and discuss the integration of DaRT into the ORS.
📅 30 July | 🕒 13:30 hrs | 📍 Kalundu Room
Restoring Wetlands, Rebuilding Futures: Ecosystem-Based Solutions for Agriculture and Climate Resilience
This side event aligns with the Ramsar STRP Task 3.3 on "Agriculture and Wetlands," aiming to address how agricultural landscapes can be managed to maintain and restore the ecological character of wetlands while ensuring agricultural productivity and local livelihoods.
📅 30 July | 🕒 18:30 hrs | 📍 Matetsi Room
The Global Peatlands Initiative: Advancing South-South Cooperation
This side event brings together Contracting Parties, the project donor, Global Peatlands Initiative partners, and key stakeholders to share ambitions to advance peatland policy, practice and partnerships, exchange best practices and lessons learned, and actively contribute to shaping the next phase of the 10-year Peatland Strategy. It also serves as a stepping stone toward shaping the Peatlands Strategy and preparing for major global milestones, such as Ramsar COP15, UNEA-7, the UNFCCC COP30 in Brazil, and progress reviews under the UNEP Medium-Term Strategy 2022–2025 and the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration.
