Nature credits are intended to help mobilise private investment for nature conservation and ecosystem restoration. Interest in such instruments has risen significantly in recent years. International agreements such as the 2022 Global Biodiversity Framework explicitly call for the use of private capital alongside increased public funding. Currently, stakeholders such as the European Commission and various international bodies and initiatives are increasingly developing concepts and pilot markets for Nature Credits and issuing them through initial programmes.

The Fair Finance Institute is working on a project on nature credits on behalf of the German Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (BfN), in collaboration with the Institute for Ecological Economy Research (IÖW – project lead) and NABU. The research project aims to gain a well-founded overview of current nature credit approaches and to derive recommendations for action for policy-makers, as well as for companies, financial actors and developers of nature credit programmes. To this end, the project team is gathering and systematising knowledge from the literature, incorporating various stakeholder perspectives through interviews and events, conducting continuous monitoring of relevant policy developments, and supporting the BfN in its participation in European processes.

Further information (in German) can be found on the IÖW website.