The CFA Incubator - Update

The CFA recently closed (Jan 31, 2020) a call for proposals for its first round of virtual incubation.  The CFA Incubator will award 5 subgrants of $25,000 each and mentorship support to the top 5 proposals received.  Announcement of the successful proposals will be made next week. Many thanks to our partners and communications channels as well as all of the amazing conservation finance entrepreneurs whom applied. We received 75 fascinating and inspiring applications from a wide geography (42 countries) and diverse organizations with over a quarter being led by women.  The overwhelming positive response to this Call combined with the quality of the proposals received has encouraged us to expand the mentoring support for projects to an additional 10 proposals.  These additional 10 chosen projects will be supported through CFA Staff and Member mentors.  All 15 projects accepted into the CFA Incubator will have the opportunity to present their ideas during the World Conservation Congress at the CFA Pavilion. We are very excited to begin the mentorship process!

 If you are interested in being a mentor and are not part of the CFA Innovation Working Group, please join the Working Group via this link.   

The following is a quick summary of the applications received: 

The diversity of applicant organizations, their geographic distribution and ideas that they contain are truly representative of the CFA membership and indicate the growing interest in the CFA from conservation finance practitioners.  We are pleased to see such a positive response and believe that we can build a solid program that will stimulate additional conservation finance activities. The CFA Incubator Technical Review Committee is currently reviewing all applications using the previously agreed upon scoring criteria. Recipients will be announced shortly.

The CFA is currently seeking additional technical and financial partnerships for the CFA Incubator, building from our current partnerships that include:

·       Fonds Français pour l’Environnement Mondial (FFEM)

·       MAVA Foundation

·       Conservation International Ventures

·       Posaidon

Please contact David Meyers, Executive Director of the CFA for further information.

Again, if you are interested in mentoring one of these amazing concepts but are not yet part of the Innovation Working Group, please join the Working Group by visiting the Innovation WG page on the CFA website or contacting the Secretariat.

Join the CFA as an Institutional Member

The CFA was created by leading organizations in conservation finance in 2002 and these institutions form the backbone of conservation finance expertise globally. Joining the CFA as an institutional member connects your organization’s key finance practitioners to the CFA’s global network and recognizes your organization's participation in the Alliance by providing a logo and link to your organization on the CFA website.

To join as an institutional member your organization should:

• Support the philosophy and Mission of the CFA.

• Provide your Logo solely for purposes of displaying your membership in the Alliance on the CFA websites and presentations.

• Commit to participation in the CFA Working Groups or Task Forces.

• Share pertinent updates and information about your organization’s conservation finance activities.

To become a CFA Institutional Member, please fill out the form on the CFA Website. Applications for Institutional Membership are processed by the Secretariat.

CFA at CAFÉ

The Conservation Finance Alliance was pleased to participate in the CAFÉ Assembly held in Kasane, Botswana in early September, 2018, hosted by Forest Conservation Botswana.

Nearly 60 CFA members and potential members gathered for a CFA-hosted networking dinner on

the second day of the Assembly. Constance Corbier-Barthaux spoke about FFEM’s commitment to CFA and why the network plays a vital role in convening experts and fostering collaboration and innovation. Karen Price, President of CAFÉ, and Rosa Montanez, President of RedLAC, shared the history of the collaboration and partnership between CFA and their respective networks, including the CTIS, the Practice Standards for CTFs, and the original Conservation Finance Guide.
 
In addition, Kathy Mikitin and Katy Mathias gave a presentation on Innovative Finance for CTFs, organized by the CFA, as part of the Assembly. They presented on Biodiversity Offsets, PA Finance through Tourism, Impact Investing & Incubators, and Project Finance for Permanence. In addition, Katy presented the preliminary results of the CTIS for calendar year 2017.

North America CFA Members and Parters Event Held December 12th

The CFA held a Members and Partners meeting in North America at World Wildlife Fund’s offices in Washington DC on October 12th.  The meeting and networking event was a great opportunity to share the CFA’s activities and strategy as well as hear from a range of members and partners and build on the CFA’s outreach.  This event comes as part of our effort to energize the network and build momentum for the wide range of conservation finance initiatives we are all working on. 
 
In addition to a presentation from the CFA Executive Director (that can be found here) we heard from a range of partners including Melissa Moye who spoke about WWF’s many conservation finance initiatives including their Project Finance for Permanence (PFP) which recently closed on the Bhutan for Lifeproject.  Chris Stone and Romas Garbaliauskas from Conservation International respectively shared their efforts to support over 30 Conservation Trust Funds (CTFs) through the Global Conservation Fund and implement a range of innovative approaches to engage the private sector in conservation finance – in part through the Coalition for Private Investment in Conservation (CPIC). Frank Hawkins of IUCN presented a detailed overview of CPIC’s initiatives including work on blueprints to replicate and scale private investments in conservation.  Forest Trends and Ecosystem Marketplace were represented by Kelly Hamrick and Michael Jenkins who shared their work on tracking market mechanisms for conservation and a publication last year on The State of Private Investment in Conservation.  Katy Mathias of the Wildlife Conservation Society explained a range of activities being implemented by WCS including work on biodiversity offsets, coral reef finance, and the Conservation Trust Investment Survey(CTIS) that is a collaborative annual report on CTF investment strategies and results.  Active discussions and questions continued through a short networking session.  As well, the Protected Areas Finance Working Group was officially relaunched by Charles Besancon as Chair (see related news).

New IUCN Report Helps Choose the Right Tools to Assess How Key Natural Areas Benefit People

IUCN has just issued new guidance to help practitioners assess ecosystem services within important sites for biodiversity and nature conservation. The report reviews nine assessment tools, focussing on their application in Key Biodiversity Areas, natural World Heritage sites and protected areas. It includes a set of “decision trees” to save time on the complex process of selecting the most appropriate tool for one’s specific needs.

The report, "Tools for measuring, modelling, and valuing ecosystem services: Guidance for Key Biodiversity Areas, natural World Heritage sites, and protected areas", is part of the IUCN World Commission on Protected Areas’ Best Practice Guidelines series. READ MORE

The guidelines have been prepared by IUCN’s World Heritage Programme and the IUCN-WCPANatural Solutions Specialist Group, and the Ecosystem Services and Key Biodiversity Areas expert working group supported by Science for Nature and People Partnership (SNAPP), with funding and in-kind contributions provided by the German Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (BfN), Canadian Council on Ecological Areas (CCEA), Center for Biodiversity Outcomes at Arizona State University, Conservation International, SNAPP, and Wildlife Conservation Society.

Clarmondial Announces New Advisory Board Member

Clarmondial is thrilled to announce that Christian Speckhardt, ex Chief Investment Officer of ResponsAbility will join them as an active advisory board member, alongside the ex-CEO & CFO of Syngenta (John Ramsay) and ex-CEO of Adveq (Sven Lidén). 

For further information please visit Clarmondial's website.

New Book on Biodiversity Offsets

Biodiversity offsets and policies aimed at achieving no net loss or net gains of biodiversity are often promoted as innovative financing mechanisms for biodiversity. Numerous publications and analyses are based on the well-documented experiences of the USA or Australia. Europe has had biodiversity offset policies since the 1970s, but these are often only described in grey literature, and not always in English. A new book published by Springer contributes to filling this gap: it provides a comprehensive overview of the full range of offsetting principles in several European countries. Each country chapter gives the respective legal background, methods adopted as well as case studies. More information about the book is available on the Springer webpage. 

Launch of Environmental Impact Reporting in Agriculture (EIRA) with Clarmondial and Wageningen University

Clarmondial AG and Wageningen Environmental Research (WEnR), supported by EIT Climate-KIC’s Climate-Smart Agriculture (CSA) Booster, have joined forces on a new initiative to promote transparency and science-based approaches to monitoring environmental impacts in agricultural supply chains.

EIRA (Environmental Impact Reporting for Agriculture) is a new reporting initiative designed to boost environmental stewardship across complex agricultural supply chains by aggregating and synthesizing key environmental impact metrics for agriculture. EIRA is intended to result in a new, low-cost, science-based tool to help financiers and agri-businesses benchmark and compare their environmental impact performance to inform better decision-making, to aggregate existing data sources, and to highlight critical research gaps.

Further information is available in the full press release.

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
Executive Director, CFA

New Report on Innovation for Coral Finance

The 2018 International Year of the Reef is an opportunity for the world’s media to highlight the many threats faced by coral ecosystems and the need to protect them. One of the main challenges faced when implementing coral conservation activities is the financing of it; the funds currently needed to achieve effective and lasting conservation greatly exceed the available funds, generating a substantial financing gap.

To explore ways of reducing this gap, the International Coral Reef Initiative releases a study of opportunities offered by innovative financing mechanisms for coral conservation. The seven most promising notions are presented. The report prompts for more integrated models, notably using a business-model approach. It introduces four example business models addressing specific coral-context challenges and how they can be used by local conservationists and decision-makers as a tool to make coral conservation sustainable. These examples are paving the way for dozens of customised coral business models still to be designed. We hope this first report will help renew the approach of coral finance.

The report is available here for download.