We Mean Business released a toolkit to aid understanding of nature-based solutions and voluntary carbon markets in 2024. It answers FAQs on nature-based solutions, voluntary carbon markets and the importance of these solutions. There’s a timeline for Article 6, as well as case studies for nature-based solution projects. It emphasises that we can only achieve global climate goals by harnessing nature-based solutions for both climate mitigation and adaptation.
This article, published in Springer Nature in July 2024, considers how REDD+ currently works for Indigenous Peoples and how it could work better. It argues that in implementing REDD+ on a project level, the burden of conservation and management tends to fall on marginalized communities, including Indigenous Peoples. The authors present 12 principles that reimagine REDD+ in a justice-oriented way.
In October 2024, the World Economic Forum collaborated with McKinsey & Company to produce a roadmap for the private sector to finance and act on nature. It argues that since the adoption of the Global Biodiversity Framework in 2022, opportunities for the private sector to engage with nature have grown rapidly. However, despite private financing rising to over $102 billion in 2023, a $700 billion annual gap remains to adequately fund nature.
Climate Impact Partners has released a guide to beyond value chain mitigation in October 2024. It explains the role of companies in climate mitigation, what beyond value chain mitigation is and how CIP has worked with Deloitte in this area. It makes the case for BVCM in terms of supporting wider decarbonisation efforts and reputation benefits. It explains: “By complementing internal strategies, BVCM expands corporate efforts beyond traditional Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions, enabling action in existing climate solutions and helping to scale new ones, ultimately advancing societal decarbonization.
In October 2024, The Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF) reported a record year – it paid the most it ever has in a single year. It made a record $111.3 million in emission reductions payments which take the fund’s total payments (including those made in previous years) to $164.5 million. It reported that FCPF participant countries are now generating about 20 million excess emission reductions. It argues that these could be monetised in carbon markets but that only about 5 million emission reductions have so far been independently verified.
In October, The UNEP shares its 2024 emissions gap report, highlighting a ‘massive gap between rhetoric and reality’. With the next round of NDCs due for submission in early 2025, the report calls for a serious raising of ambitions. The report states that countries must cut 42 percent of GHG emissions by 2030 and 57 percent by 2035 if the world is to get on track for 1.5°C.
The Nature Conservancy updated its resource on Article 6 of the Paris Agreement following developments before the UN’s COP29 in Baku. Published in October 2024, this resource explains the differences between Article 6.2, and 6.4. It also explores the relationship between Article 5 of the Paris Agreement and Article 6. It writes that although Article 5 recognises the importance of forests, it is not a financial mechanism.
Howden and Pollination collaborated to publish a report on the role of insurance in unlocking finance for nature. Released in October 2024, it covers the current state of nature finance; the current state of insurance for nature finance and the nexus between the two. To enable investment in nature, the report argues that the insurance sector can play four core roles including risk transfer, protection of natural assets and enabling trading in environmental markets.
In November 2024, Nature4Climate released a glossary for REDD+ terminology. It unpicks the notoriously confusing jargon surrounding forest protection projects and explains the jurisdictional approach to REDD+ and results-based payments.
The UK government shared six principles for voluntary carbon and nature markets in November 2024. This policy paper encourages entities to use credits in addition to ambitious actions within value chains and sets out criteria to help identify high-integrity credits. The principles state that corporates should measure and disclose the planned use of credits as part of sustainability reporting and make accurate green claims using appropriate terminology.