The UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration is an initiative led by the United Nations Environment Program and the Food and Agriculture Organization and aims to drive the restoration of one billion hectares of degraded land until 2030. Its finance task force, UN Decade FTF, which is chaired by the World Bank, has recently published a report to offer guidance and share best practice on how to attract investment to restoration activities.
The report considers the interactions between public and private investment, and the challenges in pursuing restoration projects. Among the main points it makes are the lack of a taxonomy of restoration activities and the lack of sectoral and financial policy and regulation that incentivise private sector investment in this area.
It looks at more technical details too, like the need to improve the efficiency and standardisation of portfolio management to scale up financing, and proceeds to offer best practice taken from existing programmes, like the Initiative 20×20, AFR1 and the Great Green Wall Initiative.
The paper also cites the findings of the World Economic Forum 2022 global risks report which, for the first time has five environmental risks topping the list of concerns, including natural resource crises and biodiversity loss. “Bringing back the services of once-degraded ecosystems – for example by restoring forests and agricultural soils or giving fisheries space to recover – benefits both people and the planet. Ultimately, restoration reverses the decline in the quantity and quality of the stock of natural assets,” says UN Decade.
Worth considering as COP15 will kick start this year’s global negotiations on biodiversity next month.