“Convergence, the global network for blended finance, launched the State of Blended Finance 2019 today on the sidelines of UNGA week. This is the third edition of Convergence’s keystone report, which outlines blended finance trends and key developments over the last year.”
The full press release as well as the full report are available on the Convergence Finance website.
From Behavioral Insights Team:
“We are fortunate to live in a world filled with both an abundance and diversity of life. Yet the growing scale and impact of human behaviour pose a grave risk to the natural world in irreversible ways. Deforestation, overfishing, ocean plastics, biodiversity loss, and climate change are increasingly threatening the livelihoods, health, and well-being of people as well as the species and places we know and love.
Past and current efforts in facing these challenges have tended to rely on a standard toolbox that enacts regulations, provides financial incentives or disincentives, and raises awareness about the dire consequences of our actions. These tools have merit – and are sometimes the most effective approaches we have. But oftentimes enforcement is difficult or ineffectual, payments for conservation outcomes can backfire, and information or education efforts come up against our biases, denial and wishful thinking. Behavioural science can provide a far more realistic understanding of what works, in the real world.
In this report, co-written by the Behavioural Insights Team and the conservation charity Rare, we expand the conventional toolkit and argue for a greater focus on how our cognitive biases, emotions, social networks, and decision-making environments all impact our behaviours and choices. We provide 15 concrete tools for conservation and sustainability practitioners, and the methodologies for putting them into practice, to achieve (and evaluate) real change.”
MedPAN is launching a Call for Small Projects to support the actions led in Marine Protected Areas (MPA) in the Mediterranean. The Call for Small Projects aims to reinforce MPA management. Please note that the call has specific eligibility rules. You'll find all the details below.
The MedPAN Calls for Small Project is open to:
Organisations that are in charge of the management of a Mediterranean MPA,
Other organisations (NGOs, private companies, scientific institutions, etc.) working with authorities that are responsible for the management of Mediterranean MPAs.
The Call targets the sustainable management of marine turtles by MPAs.
The eligible MPAs have to demonstrate recurrent or occasional presence of marine turtle nesting sites.
The MPA management authorities and the organisations who wish to participate will need to send the Grant Application Form to the MedPAN Secretariat before September 30, 2019.
You will find all the details regarding participation eligibility, the type of projects that are required and the selection process in the Rules document of the thematic Call for Small Projects.
To submit a grant request:
Carefully read the Rules and assess whether your structure and project are eligible.
Download the Rules of the thematic Call for Small Projects on marine turtles.
Fill in the Grant Application Form.
Download the Grant Application Form.
Send it with all the necessary documents to projet@medpan.org by September 30, 2019 midnight.
Don't hesitate to contact MedPAN for any question about this Call for Small Projects.
This Call for Small Projects is made possible through the support of the MAVA Foundation.
Got a smart project that uses nature to mitigate climate change in the United States? Then you’re in luck. Through the generous support of the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, The Nature Conservancy is announcing a request for proposals for two additional rounds of grant funding for projects with potential to substantially increase the use of natural climate solutions through the U.S. Natural Climate Solutions Accelerator program.
This grant-funding program is focused on helping kick-start innovative and scalable approaches to capturing greenhouse gas emissions by using natural and working lands in the United States. The program’s steering committee approved the first five grants in the fall of 2018 and plans to complete two additional rounds of grantmaking during the next 12 months. Awards up to $250,000 per project are available in this second round of grantmaking. Visit nature.org/NCSaccelerator to learn more about this opportunity, former awardees, how to apply, and to register for the applicant webinar. The deadline for applications is August 16, 2019.
Photo © Eric Aldrich/TNC
The CFA is soon launching the Conservation Finance Incubator - a new facility to provide virtual incubation services for innovation in conservation finance tools and solutions. The Incubator will support two potential tracks: 1) Commercial Ventures that seek to generate a financial return and 2) Finance Concepts that lead to policy, regulatory, or non-profit finance solutions. All solutions must be new ideas and show clear potential for conservation impact. Concepts can be from any sector (public, private, etc.) and can include ideas generated directly by CFA Members, partner organizations, and independent organizations and entrepreneurs. The CFA will announce a call for concepts shortly. The Conservation Finance Incubator is supported by FFEM and MAVA Foundation.
The summary for this innovative report from OECD is as follows:
“The adoption of the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011-2020 under the Convention on Biological Diversity, and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, committed the international community to a set of ambitious goals on ‘living in harmony with nature’. This requires immediate and ambitious action to protect both life below water and life on land, so as to conserve and sustainably use biodiversity and ecosystem services.
Economic instruments, such as taxes, fees and charges, tradable permits, payments for ecosystem services schemes, and environmentally-motivated subsidies, provide signals to both producers and consumers to behave in a more environmentally-sustainable way. These instruments also provide continuous incentives to achieve objectives in a more cost-effective manner, and most are also able to mobilise finance and/or generate revenue. Economic instruments are the so-called “positive incentives” embedded in the 2011-2020 Aichi Biodiversity Targets, notably Target 3.
The OECD Environmental Policy Committee (EPOC), through its unique database of Policy Instruments for the Environment (PINE), collects quantitative and qualitative information on policy instruments, in more than 80 countries worldwide. This brochure presents statistics on the biodiversity-relevant economic instruments and the finance they mobilise, based on currently available data in PINE. The data are relevant to monitoring progress towards Aichi Biodiversity Target 3 (on incentives), Target 20 (on resource mobilisation) as well as Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) Target 15.a. on finance.”
The Convention on Biological Diversity’s 15th Conference of the Parties (CBD COP15) in 2020 marks a critical juncture for one of the defining global challenges of our time: the loss of biodiversity and ecosystem service.
This new OECD report sets the economic and business case for urgent and ambitious action on biodiversity. It presents an assessment of biodiversity-related finance flows, and discusses the key data and indicator gaps that need to be addressed to underpin monitoring of both the pressures on biodiversity and the actions being implemented.
The World Bank is committed to tackling the world’s toughest development challenges – especially poverty and inequality. All of our resources – our global development knowledge, investment capital, financial expertise and country presence – are devoted to making the world a more just and prosperous place. Tourism can play an integral role in helping us fulfill this mission. In many developing countries, tourism promotes inclusive economic growth, creating jobs and attracting foreign investors.
Nature-based tourism is a growing sector and the World Bank is interested to understand what tools and resources are already available to support developing countries plan for and implement sustainable nature-based tourism offerings.
The Nature-Based Tourism (NBT) Community of Practice (CoP), part of the Environment and Natural Resources Global Practice, has commissioned a review of relevant tools and resources to help WB staff and clients enhance preparation and implementation of projects that have a NBT component.
We would like to invite to you to contribute to this process, through a short survey, to help ensure that all applicable tools and resources are captured.
The survey should take just 5-10 minutes to complete, and it will be open until 30 April 2019.
To access the survey, click here, or paste this link into your web browser https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/WB_NBT_Survey
Please circulate this invitation to others in your networks that may be interested.
Photo taken from survey site.
The Association for the Sustainable Financing of Mediterranean Marine Protected Areas (M2PA), is issuing a re-bidding regarding its Request for Proposals (RFP) to design a Mediterranean Conservation Trust Fund and to develop operational guidelines. The goal of their organization is to establish a regional conservation trust fund (CTF) dedicated to Mediterranean Marine Protected Areas (MPA) to sustain their day to day management.
The attached RFP and Terms of reference contain all the necessary information for interested candidates.
Photo from M2PA website
Prespa Ohrid Nature Trust wins the 2018 Pathfinder Award
The Prespa Ohrid Nature Trust (PONT), winner of the inaugural award, is a transboundary conservation trust fund in the Balkans that has established long-term financing, which is additionally used to attract co-financing for important conservation activities. Mirjam de Koning, the Executive Director of PONT accepted the award from the Egyptian Minister of Environment Yasmine Fouad, at the opening of the CBD COP 14 in November. Read the full story here to learn about the other winners.
Watch the BIOFIN/PANORAMA joint webinar: Innovative Protected Areas Financing and Resourcing Solutions, featuring the winners of the 2018 Pathfinder Awards.
*Photo from BIOFIN site
