Legally protect 30% of land and sea area, and integrate ecological corridors, including strictly protected areas, and manage all protected areas effectively.

Ensure that by 2030 at least 30% of areas of degraded terrestrial, inland water, and marine and coastal ecosystems are under effective restoration, in order to enhance biodiversity and ecosystem functions and services, ecological integrity and connectivity.

Active measureas are taken for threatened species and habitats to improve their status.

Ensure that all areas are under participatory, integrated and biodiversity inclusive spatial planning and/or effective management processes addressing land- and sea‑use change, to bring the loss of areas of high biodiversity importance, including ecosystems of high ecological integrity, close to zero by 2030.

Target 7. Reduce pollution

Target 5. Sustainable use of wildlife

Target 8. Minimize the impacts of climate change

Target is implemented mainly through national strategies that steer agriculture and nature policy, and binding domestic and EU-derived legal instruments that regulate land use, water, pesticides, and conservation.

Sustainable fisheries and aquaculture, using biodiversity-friendly practices and contributing to ecosystem resilience is embedded in Estonia’s main sector strategies and in binding domestic law, largely through EU and national environmental governance frameworks.

Target 11. Maintain ecosystem services

Target 13. Compliance with access and benefit-sharing measures

Target 12. Enhance green spaces

Target 17. Measures to ensure biosafety

At national level, Estonia operationalises mainstreaming biodiversity to all sectors mainly by: Requiring biodiversity-relevant considerations in planning and permitting through the integration principle, SEA/EIA, and spatial planning rules. Using incentives/compensation to align private activity and land use with conservation goals, especially where restrictions apply (notably private forests and semi-natural habitats). Applying economic instruments (charges for resource use/pollution) that can steer behaviour and generate public revenue connected to environmental objectives. Building national “accounting/measurement” capacity via ecosystem accounting and environmental monitoring systems that support policy integration and reporting.

Estonia is implementing the substance of Target 15, but the primary mechanisms are EU corporate sustainability reporting rules (CSRD/ESRS), sustainable finance disclosure requirements (SFDR), consumer protection and anti-greenwashing provisions, and the Nagoya Protocol / ABS compliance framework.

Estonia’s domestic contribution to Target 16 is mainly delivered through an integrated national waste-prevention-and-management plan, circular economy strategic direction (white paper + local roadmaps), EPR/deposit/packaging rules,  environmental charges, a dedicated food waste prevention package with sustained campaigns, mandatory/strategic green procurement, and education and consumer information initiatives.

Estonia’s approach is embedded indirectly via EU policy frameworks (especially the common agricultural policy-CAP) that reshape incentives through conditionality/eco-schemes and targeted biodiversity payments, and national budget-programme steering for biodiversity/forestry/environment management, which stresses the need for effective and stable support/compensation instruments (i.e., “positive incentives”).

Target 19. Increase financial resources

Estonia contributes to Target 20 primarily by maintaining a strong national biodiversity knowledge and monitoring system, building interoperable data and digital tools that can be used in joint research and reporting, and co-financing and participating in EU/international programmes that enable technology transfer and scientific cooperation.

Target 21. Ensure available knowledge and accessibility

Estonia implements target 22 objectives mainly through the Aarhus Convention “three pillars” approach—access to environmental information, public participation, and access to justic. It is mainly applied through EU and national law, and cross-cutting equality and accessibility frameworks that aim to remove barriers for women and girls, youth, and persons with disabilities.

Estonia operationalises a gender-responsive approach to biodiversity mainly through a strong, enforceable gender-equality and non-discrimination framework that applies across all policy domains, including environment and natural-resource governance, and participatory environmental decision-making rules that secure inclusive access to processes and remedies.

Target 6. Reducing impacts of Invasive Alien Species

Forest management is sustainable, ensuring the diversity of biota, the productivity, regeneration capacity and viability of forests, and the possibility of diverse forest use that satisfies ecological, economic, social and cultural needs.