What gets counted gets protected

Small farmers, pastoralists, Indigenous Peoples and local communities grow much of the world's food and look after much of its nature, yet many have no secure rights to their land. As countries meet at the 17th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD COP17) in Yerevan, Armenia, the International Land Coalition is calling for those rights to be recognised and counted

Small-scale farmers alone produce a third of the world's food on less than a tenth of its farmland, according to IFAD. Yet up to 28% of people in low- and middle-income countries have limited access to land or lack secure tenure (IFAD).

That is why the International Land Coalition (ILC) is watching out for key decisions coming out of CBD COP17, the UN's main summit on people and nature.

Our view is simple. The Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (KM-GBF), the world's plan for nature, will not succeed unless the people who live on and care for the land have rights to it. And we can't know whether those rights are improving unless countries measure them.

The first glimpse

In 2022, nearly all UN member states endorsed the Global Biodiversity Framework, committing to halt and reverse nature loss by 2030. It set 23 targets from restoring damaged land to protecting 30% of the planet's land and sea, to advancing sustainable agriculture and recognising rights to lands, territories, resources, and traditional knowledge.

This year's summit, which will take place in Yerevan, from 19 to 30 October, is the first time countries formally reported on progress through their seventh national reports. The early verdict, presented at SBSTTA in Nairobi in July, is clear: there has been an important effort, but progress towards many targets remains far-off. COP17 is the first COP since countries set up a permanent body for Indigenous Peoples and local communities under the convention, giving their rights and knowledge a stronger place in the talks. Countries will review progress halfway through the convention's Gender Plan of Action (GPA), a chance to ask whether women's rights to land are moving forward. And the summit comes as the International Year of Rangelands and Pastoralists draws to a close. All of which are important opportunities for progress.

The 7% problem

Part of the answer is that countries are not measuring some of the things that matter most.

In 2025, countries agreed on a way to track land rights and land use in the territories of Indigenous Peoples and local communities. Headline Indicator 22.1 is one of the critical metrics that every country is asked to report on. Yet of the 129 national reports reviewed so far, only 7% included it. And only one country, Kenya, reported it in full, drawing on global data, including LandMark, alongside data collected by community organisations.

There are understandable reasons. The headline indicator for Target 22 was agreed late in the reporting cycle. Land records are often scattered across agencies, or don't exist. And defining traditional territories in law is hard. But the result is, undoubtedly, a blind spot. If the land rights of Indigenous Peoples and local communities aren't counted, they are easy to leave out of national plans, and easy to trade away.

The other part of the answer is money. Small-scale farmers receive less than 1% of global climate finance, according to IFAD, even though they manage much of the land the global plan depends on. Finance for nature needs to reach them, with safeguards that protect their land rights.

It can be measured now, the new guide

Kenya shows it can be done and, to help other countries follow, ILC is launching a practical guide at the summit on how to report on land rights. The measure asks three simple questions about the land of Indigenous Peoples and local communities:

• Is it legally recognised? How much of the land communities hold or use is formally recognised by the state.
• Do people feel secure? Whether communities and the people in them believe their rights are safe.
• Is the land in good condition? Whether the land is stable or improving, rather than degraded.

The three answers are combined into a single score that can be tracked over time. Countries don't need perfect data to start; they can begin with what they have and improve with each round of reporting. Much of the data already exists: LandMark, the global map of community lands that ILC co-hosts with the World Resources Institute, offers ready-made figures for each country, and communities themselves hold maps, records and knowledge that no satellite can capture.

The figures also need to show whose rights are secure. Women make up nearly half of the world's agricultural workforce but hold only 15% of agricultural landowner positions, so land data must be broken down by sex. The Prindex Gender Report from 2024, likewise, showed that women were more likely to report internal factors of insecurity – divorce, death of a family member or disagreements with relatives - reflecting how women's land rights often remain conditional on relationships with others.

We are calling for women in all their diversity to take part in the gender review at COP17, and will work with the Women's Caucus on these asks. The figures must also count shared and seasonal land, such as the rangelands women pastoralists depend on. In August, the UN's desertification summit agreed to new language on land rights and on rangelands and pastoralists; COP17 is a chance to carry that into the nature talks.

This is where governments and communities need each other. Governments are responsible for the official figures, but the guide shows how communities, civil society and third-party data initiatives can supply, complement and challenge those figures before they are submitted.

What we're asking for

As countries take stock, we are asking them to:

1. Commit to measuring land rights. Encourage every country to report on Indigenous Peoples and local community land rights in its next national report, using the data available today.
2. Keep land rights at the heart of the plan. Hold on to, and strengthen, language on the rights of Indigenous Peoples and local communities, including in efforts to protect 30% of land and sea.
3. Count women's land rights. Make sure the gender review delivers land data broken down by sex and reflecting real participation for women.

In this triple COP year, Ulaanbaatar showed that land rights, women and pastoralists can win a place in the Rio Conventions, and Yerevan is where we can make them count – building on strong language, existing indicators and permanent mechanisms for direct participation. It is momentum that will carry on to climate talks in Antalya, where the people and communities acting as guarantors of the global commitments across the Rio Conventions can again be centred for their critical role.