EJN Fellowship at the UN Biodiversity Conference 2026 in Armenia

Right now, somewhere on Earth, a species is disappearing forever. Not a metaphor. Not a projection. A real living organism — a bird, an insect, a plant, a fish — slipping quietly out of existence while the world goes about its business. Scientists estimate that species are going extinct at rates tens to hundreds of times faster than the natural background rate — a crisis of biological diversity so severe that many researchers now describe it as the sixth mass extinction event in the history of life on Earth.

And yet, despite the staggering scale and urgency of this crisis, biodiversity loss remains chronically underreported in the global media. Climate change dominates the environmental journalism conversation. Biodiversity — the extraordinary web of living systems that underpins every ecosystem on Earth, including the food systems, water systems, and climate systems that humanity depends on for its survival — receives a fraction of the coverage it deserves.

The Earth Journalism Network (EJN) Biodiversity Fellowship 2026 is determined to change that. This fully funded fellowship is bringing journalists from low- and middle-income countries to Yerevan, Armenia, to report directly from the UN Biodiversity Conference — UNCBD COP17 — running from 19 to 30 October 2026. No application fee. Complete financial coverage. Expert mentorship. And a platform to tell the biodiversity stories that the world urgently needs to hear.

The deadline to apply is 29 June 2026 — which is just days away. If you are an environmental journalist from an eligible country, act now.

About the Earth Journalism Network (EJN)

The Earth Journalism Network is one of the world's most respected organizations working at the intersection of environmental issues and media. Founded by Internews — a global media development organization — EJN operates a global network of environmental journalists and provides training, fellowships, grants, and resources to help reporters around the world cover the environment more effectively, more accurately, and with greater reach and impact.

EJN's work is built on a foundational conviction: that the quality and quantity of environmental journalism directly shapes public understanding and political will on the issues that matter most for the future of the planet. When environmental stories are told well — with accuracy, depth, human connection, and international context — they move audiences, inform policymakers, and create the conditions for meaningful change. When they go untold, or are told poorly, the result is a public that does not understand the threats it faces and a political system that lacks the pressure to act.

Over the years, EJN has supported thousands of journalists across more than 180 countries, providing the training, resources, and professional networks that enable reporters to cover complex environmental topics with the sophistication they deserve. Its conference fellowships — including this one for UNCBD COP17 — are among its most prestigious and impactful programs, placing journalists from developing countries at the center of the global environmental governance conversations that most affect their communities.

The EJN's COP biodiversity fellowship is a sister program to the COP31 CCMP Reporting Fellowship on climate change — two complementary investments in ensuring that the full range of global environmental governance is covered by journalists who understand it from the inside and are committed to communicating it to the audiences that most need to understand it.

What is UNCBD COP17? Understanding the Conference

The United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity — known as the CBD — is one of the three Rio Conventions born from the landmark 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro: alongside the UNFCCC on climate change and the UNCCD on desertification, the CBD represents the international community's collective commitment to protecting the diversity of life on Earth.

The Convention has three core objectives: the conservation of biological diversity, the sustainable use of its components, and the fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from the use of genetic resources. These objectives encompass an extraordinarily wide range of issues — from protected area management and species conservation to biosafety, access and benefit sharing, indigenous peoples' rights, marine and coastal biodiversity, forest ecosystems, and the integration of biodiversity considerations into agriculture, fisheries, tourism, and urban planning.

The Conference of the Parties (COP) is the CBD's supreme governing body — a biennial meeting of all parties to the Convention that reviews progress, adopts decisions, and sets the direction for global biodiversity policy. COP17 in 2026 takes place in a particularly consequential context. The Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework — adopted at COP15 in 2022 — set the landmark "30x30" target of protecting 30 percent of the Earth's land and oceans by 2030, along with 22 other ambitious targets for halting and reversing biodiversity loss. COP17 will be a critical moment for assessing progress toward these targets, strengthening implementation mechanisms, and addressing the significant gaps between what has been committed and what is actually being delivered.

For journalists covering the biodiversity beat, COP17 is one of the most important events of the decade — a gathering where the actual state of the planet's biological systems will be confronted honestly, where the adequacy of current commitments will be rigorously tested, and where the decisions made will shape the trajectory of biodiversity policy for years to come.

Why Biodiversity Journalism Matters: The Story the World is Missing

There is a striking paradox at the heart of contemporary environmental media. Climate change — which is deeply connected to biodiversity loss and in many ways cannot be addressed without it — receives enormous and growing media coverage. Biodiversity loss, by many measures a crisis of equivalent or even greater severity, receives a tiny fraction of that coverage.

The consequences of this asymmetry are real. Public understanding of biodiversity is low. Political pressure on governments to implement biodiversity commitments is weak compared to climate commitments. Funding for biodiversity conservation lags far behind what scientists say is needed. And the communities most affected by biodiversity loss — often rural, indigenous, and coastal communities in developing countries whose livelihoods depend directly on healthy ecosystems — are the least represented in the global biodiversity media narrative.

EJN's fellowship program is specifically designed to address this representation gap. By funding journalists from low- and middle-income countries — precisely the countries where the consequences of biodiversity loss are most acutely felt and where domestic biodiversity journalism is most underdeveloped — the program invests in the kind of coverage that can actually change the conversation.

A journalist from the Amazon basin reporting on how COP17 negotiations affect the communities living on the frontline of deforestation tells a story that no correspondent from a wealthy country can tell with the same authenticity, depth, or credibility. A journalist from sub-Saharan Africa reporting on how the 30x30 target intersects with the land rights of pastoralist communities brings a dimension to the biodiversity story that is invisible in mainstream Western coverage. A journalist from Southeast Asia reporting on the connection between marine biodiversity protection and small-scale fishing livelihoods amplifies voices and realities that global policymakers need to hear.

This is the journalism that EJN is investing in through this fellowship — and this is the journalism that could define the next chapter of your career.

Yerevan, Armenia: Reporting from the Caucasus

The choice of Yerevan, Armenia as the host city for COP17 is itself a meaningful and somewhat unexpected one — and that unexpectedness is part of what makes covering this particular COP so interesting.

Armenia is a small, landlocked country in the South Caucasus — a region of extraordinary biodiversity, ancient culture, and significant geopolitical complexity. Situated at the crossroads of Europe and Asia, bordered by Turkey, Azerbaijan, Iran, and Georgia, Armenia has a natural environment of remarkable richness — from the volcanic landscapes of Mount Aragats and the Geghama mountain range to the forests of the Tavush region, the wetlands around Lake Sevan, and the semi-arid steppes of the Ararat plain.

The country faces its own acute biodiversity challenges — habitat fragmentation, pressure on forest ecosystems, water stress in Lake Sevan, and the conservation of endemic species found nowhere else on Earth. Hosting COP17 here places global biodiversity negotiations in a context where the issues being discussed are immediately and visibly relevant to the host landscape and its communities.

Yerevan itself is one of the most captivating and undervisited capitals in the post-Soviet world. One of the world's oldest continuously inhabited cities, Yerevan is a place of extraordinary historical depth, distinctive pink tufa stone architecture, vibrant cafe culture, a thriving arts scene, and a warmth of hospitality that visitors consistently find disarming. The city's famous brandy, its pomegranate-rich cuisine, its medieval monasteries just outside the city limits, and its spectacular views of Mount Ararat — historically Armenian but now across the border in Turkey — give Yerevan a character that is entirely its own.

October in Yerevan is autumn at its most beautiful. The trees of the city's parks and the surrounding hills turn gold and red, the air is crisp and clear, and the city has a particular energy during the active political and cultural season. For journalists arriving from other parts of the world, Yerevan offers a deeply rewarding human and cultural experience alongside the professional intensity of the COP.

What the Fellowship Provides: Expert Support Before, During, and After

One of the most valuable aspects of the EJN fellowship — and one that distinguishes it from a simple press accreditation — is the structured support that fellows receive throughout the entire fellowship cycle, not just during the conference itself.

Pre-Conference Preparation typically includes orientation sessions that help fellows understand the structure and agenda of the CBD COP process, identify the key negotiating issues for COP17, develop their reporting angles, and connect with biodiversity experts who can serve as sources and background resources. This preparation is invaluable — the CBD process is complex, technically demanding, and fast-moving, and journalists who arrive at COP without adequate preparation often struggle to produce the quality of reporting that the event deserves.

On-the-Ground Editorial Support during the conference provides fellows with access to experienced environmental journalists and editors who can help them navigate the sprawling COP environment, sharpen their story angles, review draft copy, and connect them with the sources, sessions, and side events that are most relevant to their reporting plans. This mentorship relationship is one of the most professionally enriching aspects of the fellowship.

Expert Briefings and Access give fellows direct contact with biodiversity scientists, CBD Secretariat officials, national negotiators, civil society advocates, and indigenous peoples' representatives — the full range of actors whose perspectives are essential for comprehensive, nuanced biodiversity reporting. EJN's institutional relationships within the COP environment open doors that would be difficult or impossible for independent journalists to access.

Post-Conference Engagement connects fellows to the broader EJN community and ongoing resources for biodiversity reporting, ensuring that the professional development the fellowship initiates continues to bear fruit long after the COP itself concludes.

The Reporting Opportunity: What Stories Await in Yerevan

For a journalist attending COP17 with the EJN fellowship, the potential for significant, impactful journalism is extraordinary. The conference will generate a rich and varied landscape of stories across multiple dimensions.

Negotiating Battles inside the formal sessions will determine the fate of key CBD decisions — on biodiversity finance, digital sequence information, marine areas beyond national jurisdiction, and the implementation of the Kunming-Montreal targets. Understanding and communicating what is actually at stake in these often technically opaque negotiations — and why it matters for real communities and ecosystems — is some of the most challenging and important journalism that can be produced at COP.

Human Stories from delegates, civil society representatives, and indigenous peoples' advocates give the negotiations a human face — connecting the abstract language of treaty text to the lived realities of communities whose forests, oceans, wetlands, and agricultural landscapes are directly affected by the decisions being made. These are often the most powerful stories from COP — and the ones that EJN fellows are best positioned to tell.

Scientific Perspectives from the biodiversity researchers and experts who attend COP in large numbers provide the evidence base for understanding how close — or how far — the world is from its biodiversity targets, and what the latest science says about the consequences of continued biodiversity loss.

Side Events and Parallel Programs generate a rich stream of stories on specific biodiversity themes — from urban biodiversity and sustainable tourism to agrobiodiversity and traditional knowledge — that often receive less coverage than the main negotiating sessions but are equally important for a complete picture of the state of global biodiversity governance.

How to Apply

1. Visit the official Earth Journalism Network fellowship page at earthjournalism.net
2. Navigate to the Biodiversity Fellowships for Journalists to Cover the UN Biodiversity Conference listing
3. Review the full fellowship description and eligibility requirements carefully
4. Prepare your CV, work samples, reporting plan, and supporting letter
5. Complete and submit the online application form before 29 June 2026