New paper: Business Models and Investments for Nature

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There has been a growing recognition of the potential of investments for nature, such as nature-based solutions (NbS), to address environmental challenges while providing multiple socio-economic benefits. While the flow of finance towards NbS is increasing, they remain severely underfunded, and the absence of consistent and monetisable revenue streams remains a key barrier for scaling up private finance towards NbS. Privately funded nature investments have strong growth potential. However, they require public finance support to de-risk investments and improved policy incentives and tax benefits to scale.

This paper, developed by finance sector members of the EU Business & Biodiversity (B&B) Platform, aims to foster a more sustainable relationship between resilient ecosystems and business activities. It also highlights six existing business cases that contribute to nature positive outcomes. These examples are identified according to high-opportunity sectors, considering materiality and impact of investment, such as in forestry, regenerative agriculture and urban ecosystems.

The paper was presented during our webinar series on COP16, which focused on private sector contributions to resource mobilization. The event was organized jointly by UNEP FI, the EU Business and Biodiversity Platform, PRI, and the Finance for Biodiversity Foundation. It was also featured at an in-person Positive Impact & Innovations event held on October 30th at the Finance and Biodiversity Pavilion in the Blue Zone at COP16 in Cali, Colombia. The discussion centered around GBF Goal D and targets 14, 15, 18, and 19.

Read the full report or the summary to know more. Read more

Biodiversity brochure for Wienerberger

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Wienerberger – producer of bricks, roof tiles, and pipe systems – has committed to drawing up a biodiversity action plan for all its 200 production locations by the end of 2023. The company asked NextGreen to help it communicate this commitment externally.

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Adaptatie Atelier (in Dutch)

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Meld je nu aan voor het Adaptatie Atelier, een nieuwe coalitie van gemeenten, waterschappen en provincies die samen beleid en prikkels willen ontwikkelen voor klimaatadaptatie (en biodiversiteit) met inwoners en bedrijven.

Financial tools workshop

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On 14 October, the Green Circle ‘Green Healthy City’ partnership was launched. Its mission: to radically green some of the Netherlands’ largest cities. NextGreen facilitated a workshop about the financial tools that can be used for this.

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Engagement with companies

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At a series of four virtual workshops on biodiversity ‘Engagement with companies’, members of the Finance@Biodiversity Community have been sharing experiences. The last workshop, held on 4 October, highlighted best practices by leading companies.

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CBD launches engagement guide for financial institutions

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A new guide explains how financial institutions can engage with the CBD COP15 process and push for an ambitious Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework. The Finance for Biodiversity Foundation, founded by NextGreen and de Horde Advies, contributed to the guide together with other partners.

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Community manager financial sector

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Since January 2021, Anne-Marie has been working as the community manager financial sector within Climate Proof Together (0.1 FTE). Within this network for and by professional ‘climate workers’, Anne-Marie tackles climate adaptation issues with financial institutions and their umbrella organizations. This builds on NextGreen’s previous work on the Analysis of Finance and Climate Adaptation. One of the first activities is organizing a lunch lecture on September 13th, 12-13 o’clock.

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Dialogue for joint solutions

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One lesson of the past year is that it’s only by working together that we can get through a crisis. At NextGreen, we enjoy working with the dialogue method, as given to us by the Jewish philosopher Martin Buber.

For Buber, equality is an essential basis for productive cooperation. Dialogue is a key concept for him. In a dialogue, speaking and listening are in balance with each other and attention is focused on perspectives and responses. Through this interaction, the dialogue partners can connect to their deeper sources. Hidden wisdom can be discovered by speaking and listening together. Through the interaction and the process of searching for answers together, creativity is released and new insights can emerge that we can build on. The dialogue therefore becomes greater than just the sum of its parts.

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Finance guide to measuring biodiversity

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Together with the EU Finance@Biodiversity Community and the signatories of the Finance for Biodiversity Pledge, we have developed a Guide to measuring biodiversity for financial institutions. As the loss of biodiversity becomes ever more urgent, financial institutions are looking for ways to quantify the impact of their finance and investment activities on biodiversity. The Guide on biodiversity measurement approaches provides a comprehensive overview of the biodiversity measurement tools that are currently in use and underway. The Guide will be presented in a webinar on April 1st, 2-3pm CET.

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Model for decision support

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Rooftop Garden Maandag Rotterdam Blaak. Design and realisation: Boekel Tuin en Landschap

In order to help municipalities and water boards to determine their policy mix to promote climate adaptation on private land, the working group decision support is developing a framework.

There are many policy tools that municipalities and water boards can use to promote climate adaptation on private land. And there are even more digital tools that are meant to facilitate the choice between the different policy tools. The working group decision support is therefore developing an overarching framework that will bring together these tools in a structured way.

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