The big COP26 U.N. climate talks kick off at the end of this month - but another crucial summit (one you may not have heard of) started this week: the COP15 negotiations of the U.N. Convention on Biological Diversity.

During the mostly online talks - and an in-person follow-up in April and May - 195 countries hope to nail down a new accord to halt and reverse losses of the planet's plants, animals and ecosystems. 

Why should you care? 

Around the world, forests and other natural ecosystems are disappearing, often to expand agriculture and production of commodities like palm oil, soy and beef as the world's population grows.

But people depend on nature to supply clean air and water, regulate rainfall that's vital to growing food - and keep the climate stable. If too many ecosystems vanish, the planet's basic life support services will falter, scientists warn.

"Most people are completely oblivious to how biology supports their lives," conservation scientist Thomas Lovejoy - who coined the phrase "biological diversity" - told me in an interview.

Chile's rare native quillay trees, for instance, long used by the indigenous Mapuche people to make soap and medicine, are the source of a key ingredient for the world's first malaria vaccine, announced last week.

A draft of the proposed new U.N. biodiversity pact includes a goal to ensure that benefits derived from the use of local genetic richness "are shared fairly and equitably" - including with indigenous and forest communities - and also support conservation and sustainable use of those resources.

Questions are growing, meanwhile, about who will benefit from an exciting new constellation of climate analytics start-ups that aim to predict how global warming will impact certain communities, zip codes and even individual properties.

The AI-driven firms are building complex models to look at flooding, winds, wildfire and other climate-related threats, fusing climate science with additional data, from satellite imagery to existing migration patterns and city street drainage.

The for-profit services could help property investors understand how different climate scenarios might hit their assets - or let governments predict where flood or wildfire interventions are needed.

But "what happens in a world where only people who have a lot of money are getting access to these predictions - and the rest of us aren't?" asked Miyuki Hino, a University of North Carolina environmental planning professor. "More data doesn't necessarily lead to benefits for everyone."

In Nepal, it's the poor who are seeing gains from rooftop rainwater harvesting.

One system, established in the Kathmandu Valley after 2015 earthquakes dried up springs and as groundwater gradually depleted, now provides clean drinking water to families year-round - something proving especially useful as warming temperatures affect other water supplies.

And is it time for fossil fuel advertisements - including those by big oil firms bragging about small investments in green energy - to go the way of tobacco publicity? We take a look at Europe's growing opposition movement.

See you next week!

Laurie

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