Nature based solutions

NBS def

UNEA 2022

seddon ey al 2020

NBS defs

“actions to protect, conserve, restore, sustainably use and manage natural or modified terrestrial, freshwater, coastal and marine ecosystems, which address social, economic and environmental challenges effectively and adaptively, while simultaneously providing human well-being, ecosystem services and resilience and biodiversity benefits”

"solutions to societal challenges that involve nature"

Examples

Cole 2026

Examples

• Provides 1 or more sustainable benefits for people AND causes no loss of biodiversity or ecological integrity (or preferably a gain) compared to the pre-intervention state

• Rewetted peatland - bringing back biodiversity and waterlogged environment to continue carbon sequestration

• Wetland creation - habitats for rare bird and insect species, storing water for farmers to use in drier seasons

• Wildflower meadow planting - pollination services for adjacent agriculture land, biodiversity, potential sequestration, human wellbeing

• Conifer plantation - historical source of timber and now carbon sequestration

Challenges

Cole 2026

• Nothing in definition to say emissions must be reduced

  • NBS are a small plaster being stuck in various places to mop up some of those crises and biodiversity loss

  • Rapid phase out of fossil fuels is the big overarching solution to CC

• Expertly and elaborately marketed concept that has no real impact

• We tend to invest a lot in new concepts, tools, programmes that direct us in a different way to solve the same problem

• risk of trying to solve the problem with the same tools that created it

Effective NBS

Seddon et al 2020

Effective NBS

Indigenous principles for NBS

Reed 2022

Indigenous principles for NBS

1. Embrace humility

2. Express relationality

3. Uphold rights and responsibilities

4. Embed spirituality

5. Support reconnection

6. Incorporate interconnectivity

7. Ensure Indigenous leadership

Paper - challenges and recommendations

Chausson 2023

'NBS concept is dissociated with the social and economic drivers of these societal challenges, including the pervasive focus on market-based mechanisms and the economic growth imperative, promoting the risk of greenwashing.'

• Often overlook root causes of CC etc

  • 'nature is presented as a solution to human problems'

• Mostly market-based solutions where private funders pay to restore nature

  • Estimations between 879 to 891 billion $

• Challenges

  • Limits to scalability

  • Reinforcing the separation of people and nature

  • Limited view of barriers to scaling NBS

  • Challenges in governance and achieveing equity for IPLCs

  • Reinforcement of global north vs south power imbalances

• Recommendations

  • Making NBS place-based and encouraging nature-human relationships like those in indigenous comms

    • Mutual relationships and responsibilities

    • Need to encourage connections between financial supporters of NBS and communites/NGOs etc on the ground and their relationships with nature

    • Embrace diversity of knowledge and opinions

    • Co-dependency rather than 'nature working for people'

  • Recognizing role of IPLCs

    • Including knowledge and supporting communities and entrepreneurship e.g. indigenous-led funds

  • Recognize alternative modes of finance

    • Shifting gov subsidies from ahrmful to beneficial industries e.g. fishing, FFs etc -> sustinable farmland

      • Current subsisidies in harmful industries could be costing US up to $1.8 trillion annually

    • Tax harmful activities - currently in CR and Columbia

      • Could gain up to $13 bill a year to put towards NBS

    • Direct funding of nature

    • Decolonial finance mechanisms - monetary aid or debt relief to help poorer countries

  • Shift away from imperative for econ growth

    • Should only be used for environmentally sustainable growth

    • Otherwise just fuelling causes of CC

    • Circular economies in harmony with nature