In a groundbreaking effort to address the urgent challenge of biodiversity loss 13 leading experts and stakeholders from 10 different countries are coming together to explore innovative solutions that unlock financial flows towards biodiversity conservation.
Kicking-off in Brussels, BIOFIN-EU, an EU funded project, aspires to revolutionize the redirection of financial resources from destructive economic activities towards nature-positive investments by creating a unifying framework and technology that creates the enabling conditions for nature-positive investments.
Activities aimed at safeguarding and restoring biodiversity, such as nature-based solutions (NbS), often involve diverse stakeholders collaborating at a local level, yielding positive yet intricately layered outcomes. To address this complexity, BIOFIN-EU establishes a categorization of NbS, alongside a menu of good governance structures and a library of stakeholder engagement. Drawing upon expertise in natural capital and economics, BIOFIN-EU’s goal is to streamline decision-making processes and expedite transaction completion by standardizing investment procedures and facilitating large-scale finance.
To accelerate nature-positive business models, BIOFIN-EU creates a data analytics and underwriting engine to advance conventional project appraisal and risk assessment and account for and model expected outcomes. Through a series of diverse real-life case studies, BIOFIN-EU will assess and validate its approach, with the aim of initiating a dual transition towards green and digital realms. This transition is essential for simplifying transaction complexities and creating conditions conducive to large-scale investments necessary for the European Union to achieve its biodiversity goals.
BIOFIN-EU’s outcomes will not only pinpoint existing gaps in the Sustainable Finance Taxonomy but also inform policy formulation through evidence-based recommendations. Furthermore, BIOFIN-EU is committed to co-designing, developing, and establishing pathways for skills and knowledge accelerators within the European financial services industry.