Hosted by the Portuguese Presidency of the European Union (EU) and the European Commission, a High Level Conference on Business and Biodiversity was held in Lisbon, Portugal, from 12-13 November 2007.

The conference was organized by ICNB (Instituto da Conservaçáo da Natureza e da Biodiversidade), IUCN-the World Conservation Union, and the Countdown 2010 Initiative. Participants from government, NGOs and business, including 150 major companies, discussed the next steps in making businesses more involved in biodiversity conservation. By the end of the meeting, the Message from Lisbon was released, calling on business, governments, the EU and NGOs to: continue raising awareness of the strong competitive advantage companies can gain from conserving biodiversity; promote the use of market, corporate responsibility and regulatory schemes; support business with operational tools for biodiversity conservation and measuring their performance in meaningful ways, especially in small and medium sized companies; and encourage new incentives to develop and strengthen partnerships between companies, governments at all levels, NGOs and academia.
Links to further information
The Conference website
IUCN press release, 13 November 2007