The next Coronavirus and the Conservation Finance Community online discussion will dive into the benefits of Mainstreaming Biodiversity in Development as a robust conservation finance mechanism in the time of Coronavirus.
When: July 10th, 11am EST
Mainstreaming Biodiversity in Development is a broad category of strategies that supports the alignment of diverse interests towards multiple sustainable development objectives. Some examples for conservation include prioritizing nature based solutions to climate change, integrating watershed management with urban development, integrated planning for SDG targets at the national level, etc. This was one of the conservation finance mechanisms that remains potentially robust despite the current Covid pandemic (see CFA Covid discussion). Three knowledgeable panelists will discuss the benefits and challenges of Mainstreaming Biodiversity in a time of COVID19. They will discuss how mainstreaming assures that investments in nature (including recovery efforts) provide essential co-benefits for other sustainable development objectives.
Meet our panelists:
Onno van den Heuvel, Manager, the Biodiversity Finance Initiative (BIOFIN), UNDP
Onno is the Global Manager for BIOFIN – based at UNDP’s Istanbul Regional Hub. He leads the BIOFIN team, responsible for all global and national activities, programme development, resource mobilisation and partnerships. Onno holds a Masters Degree in Economic Geography from the University of Utrecht
Katia Karousakis, Biodiversity Team Leader, OECD Environment Directorate, OECD
Katia is the Programme Lead of the Biodiversity, Land Use and Ecosystems (BLUE) programme at the OECD. She works within the Climate, Biodiversity and Water Division of the OECD Environment Directorate, which she joined in 2006. Prior this, she worked on climate change at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. An environmental economist by training, Katia has a PhD from University College London, U.K., and a Masters from Duke University, USA.
Tracey Cumming, Expert on Biodiversity Finance CBD, and Technical Advisor BIOFIN.
Tracey Cumming has extensive experience in biodiversity finance and policy at a national and international level. Tracey is a Technical Advisor for the UNDP Biodiversity Finance Initiative (BIOFIN), and a member of the Convention on Biological Diversity Panel of Experts on Resource Mobilisation, where she is leading the work on recommendations for resource mobilisation in support of the post-2020 global biodiversity framework for the next 10 years.
Moderator:
Sean Nazerali, Director for Innovative Financing, BIOFUND
Sean Nazerali is the Director for Innovative Financing at BIOFUND Mozambique, the national CTF. He has focused on a variety of mechanisms to increase financing for conservation, and is currently working on promoting initiatives on Biodiversity Offsets, Payments for Ecosystem Services, and mobilizing Private Sector Finance.
Background on the Conservation Finance Alliance and the Coronavirus and Conservation Finance Community Series
The Conservation Finance Alliance (CFA) is the leading global professional alliance of conservation finance experts, practitioners, and organizations. The CFA’s mission is to promote awareness, expertise, and innovation in conservation finance globally.
The CFA has recently introduced a new series of online discussions regarding the impact of COVID-19 on conservation finance, titled “Coronavirus and the Conservation Finance Community”.
To date, three online discussions have been held. The first discussion focused generally on CTF’s, with representatives from CAFÉ and RedLAC discussing how the pandemic was impacting operations, finance flows, and what the future could look like. The second discussion identified specific conservation finance tools that are viewed as most robust in the face of the crisis. Following the taxonomy of conservation finance mechanisms outlined in the CFA white paper “Conservation Finance: A Framework”, three tools were identified: Public-Private Partnerships, Blended Finance, and Mainstreaming Biodiversity in Development.
The CFA is continuing the discussion by holding three additional online calls, focusing on each of these priority finance mechanisms. The first of the three calls, which focused on Public-Private Partnerships with an emphasis on Marine Protected Areas, was recently completed on June 18th (recording available here).
The remaining calls are Mainstreaming Biodiversity in Development planned for July 10th and Blended Finance planned for late July (date will be announced shortly).