Announcement
Kumar Bhattacharyya
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David Meyers

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Upcoming Webinar: Financing Coral Reef Conservation and Management: Conservation Trust Funds and Impact Investing

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Presented by: David Meyers of the Conservation Finance Alliance and Nicolas Pascal of Blue finance
This webinar will be offered at two different times:

Description: Coral reefs provide enormous economic value to humanity and are gaining increasing attention from donors, philanthropists, and governments. This webinar will explore the use of Conservation Trust Funds and Impact Investing to support coral reef conservation. Conservation Trust Funds (CTFs) are private, legally independent institutions that provide sustainable financing for biodiversity conservation. Impact Investing is investing in companies, organizations, and funds with the intention of generating measurable social and environmental impact alongside a financial return. Specifically, the webinar will discuss how protected area, national, and regional CTFs can raise, manage, and invest financing for coral reef conservation and restoration. The webinar will also review how impact investing can be used to manage coral reef areas through public private partnerships. This webinar is sponsored by the International Coral Reef Initiative (ICRI), an informal partnership which strives to preserve coral reefs and related ecosystems around the world, as part of its collaboration with the Conservation Finance Alliance for promoting innovative financing for coral reef conservation.
Co-sponsors: OCTO (OpenChannels, The Skimmer, MPA News, EBM Tools Network) and the Reef Resilience Network
Register:

Photo by: Catlin Seaview Survey

Webinar Recap: Financing Coral Reef Conservation and Management with Tourism-Related Tools

This webinar originally aired on 17 July, 2019.

Coral reefs provide enormous economic value to humanity, and their value for recreation is one of the easiest to capture financially. This webinar will explore the range of existing and emerging tools that protected areas and site managers can use to capture funds from tourism for conservation and management. Specifically the webinar will discuss the use of: 1) entry, activity, and special use fees; 2) commercial concessions; 3) departure taxes; 4) partnerships with hotels; and 5) voluntary donations. This webinar is sponsored by the International Coral Reef Initiative (ICRI), an informal partnership which strives to preserve coral reefs and related ecosystems around the world, as part of its collaboration with the Conservation Finance Alliance for promoting innovative financing for coral reef conservation.

Presented by: David Meyers of the Conservation Finance Alliance

Co-sponsors: OCTO (OpenChannels, The Skimmer, MPA News), the EBM Tools Network (co-coordinated by OCTO and NatureServe), and the Reef Resilience Network

File(s):

coralreef_tourism_finance_july_17.pdf

Click here to download a copy of this webinar from OCTO’s Vimeo page

Click here to watch this video on YouTube

Photo Credit: FABRICE DUDENHOFER / CORAL REEF IMAGE BANK

Upcoming Webinar: Financing Coral Reef Conservation and Management with Tourism-Related Tools

Presented by: David Meyers of the Conservation Finance Alliance


Coral reefs provide enormous economic value to humanity, and their value for recreation is one of the easiest to capture financially. This webinar will explore the range of existing and emerging tools that protected areas and site managers can use to capture funds from tourism for conservation and management. Specifically the webinar will discuss the use of: 1) entry, activity, and special use fees; 2) commercial concessions; 3) departure taxes; 4) partnerships with hotels; and 5) voluntary donations. This webinar is sponsored by the International Coral Reef Initiative (ICRI), an informal partnership which strives to preserve coral reefs and related ecosystems around the world, as part of its collaboration with the Conservation Finance Alliance for promoting innovative financing for coral reef conservation.

Co-sponsors: OCTO (OpenChannels, The Skimmer, MPA News), the EBM Tools Network (co-coordinated by OCTO and NatureServe), and the Reef Resilience NetworkConservation Finance Alliance
 This webinar will be offered at two different times:·      

Viewing 1: Wednesday, July 17, Noon US EDT/9 am US PDT/4 pm UTC·      

Viewing 2: Wednesday, July 17, 9 pm US EDT/6 pm US PDT (Thursday, July 18, 9 am Australian WST/11 am Australian EST/1 am UTC)

Register:

·       Viewing 1: https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_jNI0kihxTYuh6Je3MGFalg

·       Viewing 2: https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_5Wf9DQjtToCWS-SCe_PbIg

Photo Credit: Warren Baverstock

Note from the Executive Director

Members and Partners of the Conservation Finance Alliance,
 
It is a great pleasure and an honor to address you as the first Executive Director of the CFA.  As someone who has worked in this field for many years, I have greatly benefited from the rich array of resources the CFA has developed and made available over the years and if you are reading this note, I imagine you have as well.  This wealth of knowledge on the CFA website – searchable published and grey literature resources, the Environmental Funds Toolkit – and in targeted publications such as the CTF Practice Standards, Conservation Trust Fund Investment Surveys, CFA’s webinar series, and at various meetings, trainings and workshops held at global and regional conferences – provides essential nutrients to the growing ecosystem of global conservation finance practitioners.  As members and partners of the CFA, you are the source of this knowledge and information and hopefully the beneficiary of these efforts as well.
 
I have begun reaching out to partners and members to gather background information and to harness your insights into how the CFA can optimize its historical assets and advance our shared objectives.  A more formal process will be developed shortly and we will organize an online “general assembly” to share recent developments and collaboratively plan a path forward.  Please stay tuned for upcoming announcements and communications.
 
Warm Regards,

David Meyers Short.jpg
 

David Meyers
Executive Director, CFA

M2PA and David Meyers Participate in Monaco Ocean Week

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The Association for the Sustainable Financing of Mediterranean Marine Protected Areas – or M2PA for short – held a series of related events on Friday April 13th at Monaco Ocean Week with the participation of the CFA’s new Executive Director, David Meyers.  The main goal of the M2PA association is to establish a Conservation Trust Fund to provide targeted financing for Mediterranean protected areas with an initial focus on projects in Morocco, Tunisia and Albania. The Mediterranean has over 1000 Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) but is in need of increased investment in the creation of new MPAs and in improved management and sustainable financing for many existing reserves.  It is hoped that the M2PA will succeed in becoming a strong advocate, source of financing, and fountain of knowledge for these important MPAs. 

 

The first conference event was a series of panels and presentations on Conservation Trust Funds with an initial talk and session moderation by the CFA.  Conservation Trust Fund experiences and best practices were shared by a range of CTFs and partners including BaCoMAB, PONT, MarFund, and RedLAC.  Other partner organizations presenting included CI’s Global Conservation Fund, Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund (CEPF), Fonds Français pour l’Environnement Mondial (FFEM), Agence Français de Développement (AFD), MAVA, MedPAN, and others.  The session was followed by the signing of the FFEM grant agreement with the Prince Albert II Foundation for the M2PA project.  The afternoon session was the launch of the GEF financed part of the project (with support of CI-GEF) and was followed by an evening session where 12 museums and aquariums showed their engagement in the project.  The Monaco Oceanographic Institute pledged a percentage of their entrance fees for the aquarium to the M2PA.

More information on the workshops is available here.

David Meyers to Become CFA Executive Director

The Executive Committee of the Conservation Finance Alliance (CFA) is pleased to announce that David Meyers will become the Executive Director of the CFA, effective April 13, 2018.
 
David comes to the CFA from the Biodiversity Finance Initiative (BIOFIN) at UNDP, where he served as a senior technical advisor for the BIOFIN process in 14 countries and lead on the global BIOFIN methodology.
 
“David’s first-hand experience in the practice of conservation finance, combined with his professional relationships with so many CFA members and his own experience as a long-term CFA member, make him an ideal leader for the next phase of the CFA,” said Sylvie Goyet of the Executive Committee.
 
In prior roles, David has been consultant on various conservation finance, ecology, economic and environmental projects and initiatives, an entrepreneur in environmental ventures, and a lecturer at both Yale and Columbia Universities. David earned his Bachelors and Doctorate degrees from Duke University and his MBA from the Yale School of Management.
 
“I have greatly benefitted from the resources and network of the CFA since the early 2000’s and am honored to have the opportunity to lead the organization in this exciting phase,” said Dr. Meyers.
 
Currently based on the East Coast of the United States, David has lived for extended periods in both Europe and Madagascar.
 
David will step into the Executive Director role on April 13. Through September 30, 2018, he will be working half-time while wrapping up existing commitments to UNDP-BIOFIN; starting October 1 he will be leading the CFA full-time. During the transition period, Katy Mathias will continue to support the CFA Secretariat to ensure continuity in CFA projects and administration.