Blueprints

As part of the SUSTAIN – Strengthening Understanding and Strategies of Business to Assess and Integrate Nature – project, businesses, financial institutions and regulatory bodies can also find other documents that can help them in the process of understand, assess, and monitor the dependencies and impacts on nature from activities across different sectors of the economy. 

CPIC, in collaboration with South Pole, and other SUSTAIN partners, developed four investment blueprints to enable financial institutions seeking to positively impact biodiversity through conservation projects to understand existing investment frameworks better. 

CPIC blueprints are model financial transaction structures intended to help facilitate replicable investments in priority conservation projects. A blueprint describes the general enabling conditions necessary to facilitate project development, the stakeholders and their roles, the project outputs and expected conservation outcomes, the anticipated cash flows, and the types of investors and capital stacks that are required for a financial transaction that delivers both economic and conservation returns.

1. Transforming degraded land into productive forests through blended finance

This blueprint highlights Belterra’s use of a blended finance instrument and outlines the enterprise’s innovative business model. Operating through a financial
support framework, through the implementation and management of agroforestry systems, Belterra delivers direct investment to small and medium-sized rural producers and assists the provision of loans from financial institutions to producers, while simultaneously generating high-integrity carbon credits.

2. Channeling private finance into habitat banking schemes in England

This blueprint highlights the RSPB’s use of a commercial debt instrument to refinance the acquisition of its habitat banking site, enabling delivery of habitat restoration in advance of income receipts, and freeing up the charity’s cash reserves to support its wider conservation efforts.

3. Impact investment unlocking equity for scaling the use of agricultural by-products for sustainable livelihoods

With the support of a low-interest loan from The Landscape Resilience Fund and Sustainable Trade Initiative (IDH) Farmfit Fund, Koa, a Swiss-Ghanaian social enterprise, leveraged this financing and the technical support that came with it to attract additional commercial investments. This strategic approach not only enabled the enterprise to scale its operations through increased production but also enhanced its conservation impact.

4. Channeling private finance into nature rewilding projects

Heal Rewilding, a UK nature recovery charity, leveraged a blend of concessional and commercial debt, as well as, public and private donations to acquire its first site in 2022 – Heal Somerset. To repay the loan and manage the site, Heal uses diverse repayment structures, including public and private sector land sponsorship, donations, and ecosystem services. This blueprint showcases how this blended debt structure can rapidly enable nature-led recovery projects on smaller sites.