The African Natural Capital Alliance (ANCA) has launched an initiative seeking to channel $10 million towards nature-based solutions over the next three years in collaboration with the Global Biodiversity Framework Fund (GBFF) among others.
ANCA partnered with Oxford University and the African Leadership University School of Wildlife Conservation to establish a fellowship programme on nature and biodiversity finance, funded by the UK’s Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs.
The initiative will see the participation of 20 executives from financial institutions and other relevant sectors across the continent, ANCA said in a press release.
The fellowship’s goal is to mobilise $10 mln into nature-based solutions projects over the first three years of the programme, with plans to double that by the end of five years.
As ANCA explained, the initiative intends to create a pipeline of projects designed to improve biodiversity and bolster corporate disclosures of nature-related risks and opportunities, as well as deliver community benefits such as improved livelihoods, new jobs, and increased resilience.
Funds will come from the participants’ own organisations, the GBFF, public and private sources, and development banks.
“The programme aims to address the urgent need for more financing of sustainable natural capital management in the continent and empower senior managers and executives in Africa to become catalysts for change,” ANCA said.
Established in 2022 by non-profit FSD Africa, ANCA is an African-led initiative whose members – including the likes of Standard Chartered, KCB, and Equity Bank – together manage assets of $390 billion.
Earlier this year, ANCA said it plans to establish a comprehensive nature data platform for the continent, in a bid to drive investment into nature-based solutions such as carbon and biodiversity credits.
The working group hopes to lay out its working strategy by the UN biodiversity conference COP16 in October in Colombia, before potentially launching the platform in around a year’s time, Dorothy Maseke, head of the alliance’s secretariat, told Carbon Pulse in April.
Africa’s biodiversity credit markets have suffered so far from poor demand from European and North American companies, who are more keen to invest where their supply chains have an impact.
In a report released in May, the Biodiversity Credits Incubator recognised biodiversity credits as an opportunity to scale investments in the region.
Yet, speaking to Carbon Pulse, one of its early members advised caution since it is “still a young emerging market with several key challenges facing it before it is fully adopted”.
By Giada Ferraglioni – giada@carbon-pulse.com
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