Advancing Nature-Based Solutions in Cities Lessons from the State of Finance for Nature in Cities Report 2024

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Urban nature-based solutions (NbS) address multiple challenges in cities, including climate change, biodiversity loss, disaster risk, water and food security, and human health. However, for urban nature to reach its full potential, investments need to be substantially scaled up. Urban Nature-based Solutions therefore present a fast-growing, time-sensitive opportunity to reshape the way urban adaptation and resilience investments are made to incorporate nature and biodiversity.

UNEP’s State of Finance for Nature 2023 report estimates that the total annual finance flows to NbS have increased by 11 per cent from roughly US$200 billion in 2022. However, although gaps in finance flows towards NbS are well established, a critical missing piece of the puzzle is how much of these gaps are attributable to urban areas. Only in the last decade or so have global policy and financial institutions started to recognize and measure financing at subnational and urban scales and identify them as a critical focus for green investments. Efforts to gather data and define the costs and benefits of urban NbS are just beginning. For example, the World Bank and the Nature Conservancy have running assessments while Naturvation, an EU focused database, inventoried USD 800 million to USD1.1 billion worth of urban NbS dating from 2008 to 2017 before it discontinued its counts.

In this nascent space, UNEP and the Penn Institute for Urban Research, University of Pennsylvania, have developed the State of Finance for Nature in Cities to take stock of urban NbS investments. The publication aims to establish a framework that enables cities to begin gathering such requisite information, as it outlines gaps and opportunities for NbS financing in cities, best practices from around the world, and actions that local governments, financial stakeholders, private sector, and knowledge partners can take to scale up investments for nature in cities.

In 2024, UNEP and the University of Pennsylvania will release the second edition of the State of Finance for Nature in Cities which will build on the action points of the 2023 report. This event will serve as a launching pad for the report, which will outline the benchmarking framework and process, digging deeper into the challenges and delivering new insights and actionable recommendations for closing the data gap. Finance experts and city representatives will discuss the implications of this analysis and present their views on how additional finance for urban NbS projects can be achieved and support global and local sustainable development goals. The first part of the session will include 5 minutes of opening remarks, followed by a 35-minute panel discussion on the 2024 State of Finance for Nature in Cities report, featuring local and national government representatives, and partners who will share their experiences and recommendations. This will be followed by a 10-minute Q&A