Bridge Magazine - Volume 2

Inspiring the World

Gabon Emerges as Global Conservation Leader

Voices: We Must Save Fresh Water to Save Ourselves

FROM THE DESK OFJennifer Morris

Dear Friends,

Last year’s UN Convention on Biological Diversity (COP15) saw a landmark commitment to protect 30% of Earth’s lands, oceans, coastal areas and inland waters by 2030—a much-needed international blueprint to guide our collective turnaround of the biodiversity crisis within this crucial decade.

The world doubled down on its collective efforts to conserve water at the UN Water Conference, which was recently held for the first time in more than 40 years.

Our work to get fresh water on the global agenda is yielding results.

That said, an enormous amount of work is still needed to secure the health of the planet’s declining freshwater systems. Recognizing the urgency, TNC is scaling up our commitment to freshwater conservation in this most critical decade for nature.

I am particularly excited to welcome Nicole Silk back to TNC as our new global director for freshwater outcomes. Supported by a growing team of conservation leaders, she is spearheading TNC’s efforts to meet our ambitious 2030 freshwater goals. Read

Nicole’s personal water story and what she thinks is needed to accelerate our global conservation efforts in the years to come (pg. 4).

This issue of Bridge magazine is full of stories about how TNC is advancing freshwater conservation around the world. Discover how Gabon is emerging as a global conservation leader (pg. 8), visit a water-wise church in Philadelphia (pg. 22) and sit down with TNC’s Tara Moberg to understand the significance of the recent Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (pg. 26).

These highlights represent just a fraction of the incredible work happening across our global freshwater portfolio—none of which we could do without your generous support. Thank you for joining us as we strive to meet the moment and step up for fresh water like never before.

Warm Wishes,

JENNIFER MORRIS Chief Executive Officer

4 We Must Save Fresh Water to Save Ourselves

BY NICOLE SILK

20

NOTES FROM THE FIELD

• Water Funds in Africa: Going Further Together

• Benefits Flow from New Rain Garden at Philadelphia Church

• Innovative Solutions for Healthy Rivers and Clean Energy

FEATURE

8 Inspiring the World Through Action

BY SARAH WAKEFIELD ADHYA

Investing in Nature for Water Security

BY SOPHIE TRÉMOLET AND NAABIA OFOSU-AMAAH

26

ON THE COVER: Germaine Ngniwgwa, 54-years-old, is a fisher and Efoulatchi Co-op member on Lake Oguemoué, a small lake located in Gabon’s Ogooué Basin. TNC has been working with OELO (L’Organisation Ecotouristique du Lac Oguemoué) and other partners to establish fishing cooperatives, adopt responsible fishing practices and to generate income through sustainable use of resources in the area.

In Conversation with Tara Moberg

Cover photo: Roshni Lodhia.

Pictured: The Aberdare mountains are the source of the Tana River in Kenya. © Roshni Lodhia

WE MUST SAVE FRESH WATER TO SAVE OURSELVES

BY NICOLE SILK Global Director for Freshwater Outcomes

AS THE TWIN THREATS OF CLIMATE CHANGE AND BIODIVERSITY LOSS COME TO A HEAD THIS DECADE, THE FATE OF OUR FRESH WATER LIES IN THE BALANCE. Extreme weather is becoming increasingly common, bringing massive rainfall and flooding in some regions and widespread heat and drought in others, with disastrous impacts on both

Now is the time to come together and protect our world’s dwindling freshwater ecosystems

THE WATERFALLS OF PLITVICE LAKES NATIONAL PARK Croatia’s largest national park covering almost 30,0,00 hectares. © Ken Geiger/TNC

humans and nature. At the same time, we have lost nearly a third of the world’s freshwater ecosystems, and monitored freshwater populations have declined by an average of 83% since 1970, a rate that is significantly higher than that of terrestrial and marine populations in the same timeframe.

Freshwater ecosystems deliver the water on which all life depends. The urgency to better protect them is now. We need to set clear benchmarks to protect rivers, lakes and wetlands for people and the planet and support the elements essential for life and health within freshwater systems. To bend the curve of loss and decline, we must pursue solutions that are durable and long-lasting, coupled with approaches that address social, economic and political instability. This is our road ahead.

We have years, not decades, to get this done.

Water Connects Us All

My interest in fresh water started early. I grew up in Northern California in the 1970s during a widespread water crisis. We had to carefully ration our water usage and watch the meter. I became obsessed with the story of our water. Turns out, some of what we drank in San Francisco and Berkeley was snowmelt from faraway Yosemite and rainwater filtered through the Mokelumne watershed in the Sierra foothills.

A few years later, when I was working as a river guide, leading tourists along their own paths of curiosity about water, I added a new dimension to my understanding of its long-distance journey to our taps. Water doesn’t flow straight to us—and it’s not for us alone.

It eddies into backwaters, feeds the roots of great trees, cradles the young of trout and damselflies, and seeps through the natural filtration systems that are wetlands. Yet, since these same systems can also be viewed as mere structures through which water flows toward human needs, all too often we overlook their critical connection to life as we know it.

We have sliced through our rivers with dams, filled in wetlands, and paved over places where water could slow down and settle. We have recontoured and rearranged the flow of rivers, added toxic chemicals that choke life, severed connections between surface flows and groundwater,

1/3 The world has lost nearly one-third of its freshwater ecosystems since 1970.

83% Monitored freshwater populations have declined by an average of 83% since 1970.

1M TNC’s goal is to conserve 1 million kilometers of the world’s rivers by 2030.

30M TNC also aims to conserve 30 milllion hectares of lakes and wetlands by 2030.

WATER FOR WILDLIFE

© ZhuoWen Chen/TNC Photo Contest 2021

making and access to benefits as we invest in healthy freshwater systems. Many of the broad sweeps of terrain needed to sustain and protect freshwater systems are governed by Indigenous Peoples and local communities who have a history of good stewardship and are valuable partners in our way forward. Marginalized populations, characterized by factors like income, race, or political exclusion, have higher barriers of access to fresh water and influence that need to be addressed.

and demanded that water flowing through these systems serve us with food, power and utility on our schedule. This has had massive impacts on aquatic species and ecosystems.

Water also dictates the diversity and distribution of the terrestrial biosphere, and we need to be more aware of this in order to restore the connection between people, water and the planet.

We Must Work Together to Protect Fresh Water

To reach our aspirations, we must pursue strategies and work together—whether we are freshwater ecologists, policy or legal experts, economists, hydrologists, or financial professionals. Whether we represent overnments, nonprofits, local organizations or corporations. Whether we are new to working together or longtime partners. Water demands collaboration and coordination. It is always on the move, crossing jurisdictional and other boundaries, connecting communities, and linking people to nature.

Because of the way water connects us all, we must consider equitable participation in decision-

We have a new sense of what is possible and where to begin, yet only by working together can we achieve our full potential.

We Must Accelerate the Pace and Scale of Freshwater Conservation

TNC has a long history of freshwater conservation that extends back to 1955. Our current freshwater portfolio represents an unrivaled scope of work—453 projects in 35 countries and all regions of the world.

We are working where water is plentiful and where it is not, where wetlands connect surface and groundwater, and where source waters connect to drinking water. We are partnering with farmers and ranchers to improve water quality and addressing issues of connectivity and river flow, including barrier and dam removal. We deploy naturebased solutions to deliver benefits for both people and nature—such as water funds, environmental flow regimes, and farming and ranching

Water demands collaboration and coordination. It is always on the move, crossing jurisdictional and other boundaries, connecting communities, and linking people to nature.

practices—and we deploy policy and financial solutions and partner commitments that help our freshwater protection efforts become more durable for the long-term.

Early estimates suggest that these projects could get us halfway toward TNC’s 2030 goals for fresh water: 1 million kilometers of rivers and 30 million hectares of lakes and wetlands conserved. No other global conservation organization has committed to such bold goals. Yet the health of future generations demands that we do more.

To accelerate the pace and scale of our freshwater conservation efforts, we need to boldly pursue solutions that not only protect and restore connectivity within systems but also those that advance resilience, improve governance, introduce financing innovations and enable inclusive

approaches that leave no one behind. We also need to make use of force multipliers, such as our combined ability to influence policy, corporate and customer behaviors, and public will.

The state of our world’s climate, its natural systems and human well-being are inextricably linked. Our response must be equally interconnected and catalytic. From local and regional initiatives to pushing the needle on global action frameworks, the race is on.

Only by working together, shoulder-toshoulder, will we achieve success.

Nicole Silk is the Global Director for Freshwater Outcomes at The Nature Conservancy.

FRESHWATER LIVELIHOODS © Deba Prasad Roy / TNC Photo Contest 2022

INSPIRING THE WORLD Through Action

Determined to protect 30 percent of its terrestrial, freshwater and marine habitats, Gabon is emerging as a conservation leader.

GABON IS A PLACE OF SEEMINGLY ENDLESS NATURE. Its forests blanket the land. Its rivers bend and tumble and nourish. Its ocean leaps with life.

BY SARAH WAKEFIELD ADHYA Communications Manager, Protect Oceans, Land and Water

Along the Atlantic Coast, hippos bellow from river shallows and wade into saltwater waves. Clusters of juvenile sea fish flit among the protective roots of mangroves, while thousands of leatherback and olive ridley turtles, the

largest congregations in the Atlantic, lay their eggs on the sandy beaches.

Further inland, a significant proportion of the world’s remaining western lowland gorillas roam with chimpanzees, tufty eared red river hogs, African forest buffalo and different types of antelope, like delicately featured duikers and marsh-dwelling sitatunga. Over 700 species of birds flutter and trill, while rare slendersnouted and African dwarf crocodiles navigate watery caves and wooded streams bearing nutrients to the sea.

population living in urban areas, 88 percent of the country is covered with trees, home to reclusive, critically endangered forest elephants. Gabon’s inland and coastal forests are so vast, they sequester more carbon dioxide each year than the amount produced by 30 million cars, helping the world stave off climate change through the natural process of photosynthesis.

As intact ecosystems and species diversity rapidly diminish around the world, the stakes are high for conserving extensive habitats like what remain in Gabon. But long-term, durable and effective protection can be expensive and extremely complex. Gabon is committed to being a leader in this space and a model to others in Africa and around the world.

“It is very crucial for the world to acknowledge the importance of biodiversity,” says Stanislas Stephen Mouba, director general for environmental protection in the Ministry of Environment of Gabon. It is important for both the economy and for people, he says.

Big Ambitions

Much of Gabon’s economic growth has come from the export of natural resources like oil and manganese, but oil revenues are declining. With approximately 800,000 young Gabonese on track to enter the work force in the next decade or so, the government must create new jobs and find a way to do this in balance with its ambitious environmental goals.

Much of Gabon remains wild and remote. With more than four-fifths of the nation’s

“We are convinced that investment in biodiversity conservation and natural capital is critical for human wellbeing,” Lee White, Gabon’s minister of water, forests, the sea and environment, told attendees at a high-level meeting on global biodiversity protection hosted by Colombia in 2021.

LAKE OGUEMOUÉ Martial Angoue, 44 years, Amven Co-op member and OELO fisheries data collector. Nlong village on Lake Oguemoué. TNC has been working with OELO (L’Organisation Ecotouristique du Lac Oguemoué) to establish fishing cooperatives, sustainable fishing practices and to generate income through the sustainable use of resources. © Roshni Lodhia

For example, a switch to sustainable forestry and a ban on the export of whole-log timber was a way to protect forests and create jobs.

“Traditionally, we exported logs from Gabon to the rest of the world,” says White. “When you export a log, you are retaining about eight percent of the value of the wood, and so you’re gifting over 90 percent of the value added to the country that imports your log and transforms it into furniture or parquet or [other items].” Producing these finished wood products locally will keep profits in Gabon.

Payment for carbon dioxide captured by healthy forests is also bringing in funds. Last year, Gabon received the first installment of US$150 million from Norway, through the Central African Forest Initiative, in exchange for demonstrated progress in forest protection and emissions reductions. The hope is this will lead to future payment structures that compensate Gabon for its forests’ contribution to mitigating global climate change.

Gabon is part of the High Ambition Coalition, a group of over 100 countries advocating for a global commitment through the UN Convention on Biological Diversity to protect 30 percent of the world’s land and ocean by 2030. It is one of several countries pushing for the inclusion of a 30 percent goal for fresh water as well. For a nation whose culture and landscape are shaped by its rivers, this expanded 30:30:30 goal has a special significance. “Over the last three decades, Gabon has been gradually building the laws and institutions that we need to preserve forests and ecosystems,” says White.

Gabon announced its plan to create a series of protected areas in 2002 and established the National Agency for National Parks (Agence Nationale des Parcs Nationaux) in 2007. It now has 13 national parks and two World Heritage sites, plus nine Ramsar Wetlands of International Importance, which cover a total of about 22 percent of the country. Offshore, Gabon has established 20 marine

EARLY MORNING FISHING Fishers on Aschouka Island. © Roshni Lodhia

In Gabon, life is built around water. The river provides people with water to quench their thirst and food to eat through fishing.”

JEAN CHURLEY MANFOUMBI, Manager of TNC’s freshwater and communitybased conservation program in Gabon

protected areas across 20,060 square miles (51,955 sq km), which represent about 26 percent of its ocean territory.

Managing these areas remains a challenge, however, due to variable protection designations and limited funds. The isolation of Gabon’s natural habitats means they are harder to access, but it also makes them harder to steward. Marine protected areas are distinctly difficult to monitor, and they are easily accessible to the fishing boats drawn from around the region to Gabon’s bountiful offshore ecosystems.

Taking Conservation to the Next Level

To help meet its ambitious goals, Gabon is partnering with organizations, like The Nature Conservancy (TNC), who have the expertise to advise on sciencebased conservation and land-use plans and the creation of transformational, lasting protection initiatives. “Our deep experience in protected area creation and implementation,” says White, “teaches us that measuring, monitoring and protection efforts

in data-poor, biodiverse countries like Gabon will require a disproportionate burden on resources—financial, technical, human and other.” Motivating the right expertise and support will be essential to success.

TNC began working in Gabon 10 years ago, with a focus on fresh water. Every year, more than six feet (nearly two meters) of rainfall move through the vast Ogooué River watershed, which contains some of the last free-flowing large rivers on Earth. Gabon wants to harness some of this hydropower in order to shift away from an oil-based economy.

But how can the country do this in a way that minimizes the impact on natural habitats and local livelihoods? Hundreds of species of fish live in the country’s rivers and streams, and a third of them live nowhere else on Earth. With fresh water, as with terrestrial and marine conservation, TNC started with science, mapping and classifying species and habitats and water flows to create a decision-support

A GREAT WHITE EGRET

The Ogooué River is the principal river of Gabon. It’s rich in birdlife and wildlife such as the rosy bee-eater, pelican, African Fish Eagle, forest elephant, hippo, and the slender-snouted crocodile. © Roshni Lodhia

tool that could guide conservation and sustainable development in the basin.

The 30:30:30 goal will require partnership and funding on a level not seen in traditional conservation efforts. TNC is now doing the groundwork for the possible use of a series of powerful tools to facilitate durable, long-term protection.

“We’re hoping to be a catalyst,” says MarieClaire Paiz, TNC’s Gabon country director, “bringing science, expertise, partnerships and financial resources to create a new way of doing conservation, so that what we’re doing today will really remain, and we’ll see the benefits in another 10, 30, 50 years from now.”

A Toolkit for Durable Conservation

One of the challenges facing durable conservation, where protected areas are monitored and stewarded in perpetuity, are the ups and downs of funding availability from public and private sources. Mechanisms like project finance for permanence, which TNC is deploying through the Enduring Earth partnership, help bring significant funds together at the start of a project, creating legal and financial structures to ensure protected areas are not

just lines on paper, but monitored and stewarded for years to come.

The project finance for permanence (PFP) approach helps countries ramp up the pace and scale of conservation to meet large-scale regional and global goals. It also puts an emphasis on working with local communities to increase the long-term success of conservation planning and management. Successful PFP projects have been completed in Canada, Costa Rica, the Brazilian Amazon, Bhutan and Peru.

At the UN Biodiversity Conference in Montreal last December, Gabon announced its commitment to pursue a PFP project. The effort will support the protection of more than 24,000 square kilometers of forest, 8,000 square kilometers of ocean and 4,800 kilometers of river. Improved forest management is expected to contribute the equivalent of 30 million tons of carbon mitigation annually.

Balancing the Needs of Nature and Local Communities

“In Gabon, life is built around water,” explains Jean Churley Manfoumbi, manager of TNC’s freshwater and community-based conservation program in Gabon. “The river provides people with water to quench their thirst and food to eat through fishing.” The names of provinces are linked to river systems, the style of hand-carved boat paddles reflects the

LOANGO NATIONAL PARK

The park consists of rainforest, savanna grasslands, lagoon and ocean. © Roshni Lodhia

prevailing currents and character of local rivers, and many Gabonese who have moved to the cities to work or access services still return to their home villages during the dry season, when water levels are low and fishing can be more productive.

Outside of the cities, population centers are smaller and more dispersed. Local communities, which include Gabon’s many Bantu and forestdwelling ethnic groups, rely directly on healthy ecosystems for food and livelihoods. Yet crops can be damaged by elephants, whose movements are shifting due to climate change and other factors like poaching. Forest allocations and park boundaries can conflict with community lands and local traditions. Hydroelectric projects can disrupt populations of river fish.

An integral part of successful, long-term conservation is addressing the needs and rights of local communities. Conservation efforts are stronger and more effective when Indigenous Peoples and local communities are included as stewards, knowledgeand rights-holders, and beneficiaries.

TNC is working with a local NGO partner, Organisation Ecologique des Lacs et de l’Ogooué (OELO), to conduct early initiatives in communitybased conservation around Lake Oguemoué and other areas. Together, TNC and OELO are gathering social and ecological data, exploring sustainable economic options for residents—from community forests to fishing cooperatives—and conducting a pilot project in the use of low-tech elephant fencing to protect crops.

“I believe that nature is the future,” says Rengouwa Maeva, local resident and OELO’s sustainable fishing program coordinator, “because to become selfsufficient, we have to turn to nature.”

people will thrive side-by-side. The Nature Conservancy is committed to helping the people of Gabon find this balance.

Editor’s Note:

Life revolves around the water in Gabon, and the country’s extensive, unfragmented waterways were what first drew TNC to Gabon 10 years ago. Gabon is now committed to protecting 30 percent of its freshwater, terrestrial and marine ecosystems by 2030.

This article includes excerpts from video interviews conducted by Roshni Lodhia and Mike Pflanz, with logistical support from our Gabon and Africa teams.

With the right planning, partnership and action, Gabon’s wealth of diverse habitats, wildlife and

INVESTING IN NATURE FOR Water Security

The Private Sector and the Power of Collaboration

BY NAABIA OFOSU-AMAAH Senior Corporate Engagement Advisor

BY SOPHIE TRÉMOLET Europe Freshwater Director

This article originally appeared in Private Sector & Development Magazine

AROUND THE WORLD, THE IMPACTS OF CLIMATE CHANGE HAVE BECOME IMPOSSIBLE TO IGNORE. STORIES OF INCREASED DROUGHT, MORE INTENSE STORMS AND CHANGING RAINFALL PATTERNS ARE BECOMING COMMONPLACE. AMONG OTHER IMPACTS, THESE CHANGES ARE PUTTING GLOBAL WATER SECURITY AT RISK. ACCORDING TO THE UN, ABOUT 4 BILLION PEOPLE, REPRESENTING NEARLY TWO-THIRDS OF THE GLOBAL POPULATION, ALREADY EXPERIENCE SEVERE WATER SCARCITY DURING AT LEAST ONE MONTH OF THE YEAR, AND BUSINESSES CONSISTENTLY RANK WATER RISK AS A TOP CONCERN, BASED ON A SURVEY PUBLISHED BY THE WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM EVERY YEAR.

EXTREMA, MG, BRAZIL © Felipe Fittipaldi

Ensuring humanity’s water security is an issue of top priority for public and private sector leaders around the world. How to get there, however, is currently up for debate. The Nature Conservancy (TNC) has articulated a clear vision to tackle this challenge - a vision rooted in nature.

While traditional grey infrastructure has been and will remain a centerpiece of global water management, significantly more investment is needed in green infrastructure, which is flexible, cost-effective and resilient, and can generate a multitude of benefits for nature and people. Investing in nature to strengthen the resilience of global watersheds can deliver measurable benefits to those most vulnerable to climate change and be good for business. That’s why we must prioritize these investments on our path to 2050.

WATER FUNDS: HARNESSING THE POWER OF NATURE FOR WATER SECURITY

TNC has worked for over two decades to demonstrate how investments in nature can deliver

water benefits to those who need them most. The creation of Water Funds—purpose-built collective action mechanisms that promote upstream conservation practices to drive measurable downstream water quality and quantity benefits—has been a primary focus to date. These structures enable stakeholders to overcome common challenges such as governance fragmentation and lack of coordination and help them invest at scale in nature-based solutions like reforestation, habitat restoration and sustainable agricultural practices.

Watershed investment is not an individual endeavor. Creating watershed-scale change requires a team of stakeholders—including local communities, public entities and the private sector—working together in lockstep to define common objectives and approaches. Water Funds are designed to facilitate this collaboration, bringing stakeholders together to implement the actions that the watershed needs most.

Since the first Water Fund was established in Quito, Ecuador in the early 2000s to restore and

SEEDLINGS OF THE BOMBACACEAE FAMILY

© Adriano Gambarini

protect the páramo (large areas of wetlands in the Andes that act as a sponge and regulate water flows), TNC has worked with partners around the world to support the establishment of 44 Water Funds. From South America to Europe, the United States, Africa and the Asia Pacific region, TNC and partners have designed custombuilt Water Funds to address a number of water security challenges.

THE ROLE OF THE PRIVATE SECTOR

Though Water Funds can benefit both communities and nature, financing and launching these projects with the right stakeholders can be a lengthy, complex process. To be successful, Water Funds require an ‘anchor organization’ or local lead, which is usually a city or a public utility. But for these stakeholders, who have for so long relied on traditional, grey infrastructure as the only solution, investing in nature often represents a paradigm shift, and securing their necessary buyin can be a challenging feat.

The private sector has a unique role to play at this critical early stage. In several cases, corporations that were actively working to address water security challenges in their production centers provided critical early funding and guidance that helped TNC get new Water Funds off the ground. They understood that in order to fulfill their responsibilities as water stewards, working at the level of a single production facility (like a bottling plant) could not deliver meaningful change in complex systems that are shared and influenced by many actors. Instead, they recognized that investing in larger coalition building can deliver more impactful results over a longer period. This is critical as

most investments in nature need to be sustained over time to generate impact.

In early 2018, for example, The City of Cape Town in South Africa faced a prolonged drought that left the city of 4 million people days away from Day Zero—the point at which taps were predicted to run dry. While Cape Town narrowly escaped the worst-case scenario due to the arrival of the winter rains and water pumped from a neighboring region, the crisis created a sense of emergency and triggered multi-pronged action.

TNC and its local partners focused on making the case for investing in nature and together showed that removing water-thirsty invasive plants in the upper watershed (in a targeted and sustained manner) could save 55 billion liters of water per year, the equivalent of 2 months’ worth of water supply to the city within the first six years of the program. The analysis also showed that this could be done at 1/10th of the cost of grey infrastructure solutions considered by the City.

“Investing in nature to strengthen the resilience of global watersheds can deliver measurable benefits to those most vulnerable to climate change and be good for business.”

But getting this idea off the ground and mobilizing funding for implementation was not easy. Early commitments from the private sector made the difference as they created critical momentum needed to prove out the plan and inspire public investment for long-term sustainability. An initial $100,000 investment from one company in 2017 helped leverage nearly $3 million in private support and subsequently inspired a $4 million investment to date from the City. The project is now underway to generate an astonishing 100 billion liters in annual water gains within 30 years.

A similar story played out in São Paulo, Brazil, where TNC is working with farmers and other landowners to restore forests to address local water quality issues and tackle climate change (there are approximately 1.1 million tons of carbon stored in standing forests within the São Paulo Water Fund’s geographic scope and 45,000 additional tons of carbon being captured across local restoration and conservation sites each year). Again, it was early investments from 6 corporations that helped generate the momentum needed to start this program. More than 18 companies have since

committed nearly $6 million, which has helped leverage over $16 million to date from 4 new public funding sources. Together, this support has helped TNC and partners restore, conserve and implement land use best practices on 25,000 acres.

GETTING TO SCALE, TOGETHER

The hard truth is that developing one Water Fund at a time will not be sufficient to address water security challenges that keep growing by the day. To scale, we need to equip entities that work across the globe, such as development finance institutions and corporations, and address the many barriers to entry that exist in developing watershed investment programs. And we must do it fast.

To that end, TNC and partners have developed a full range of tools, associated training programs and technical assistance facilities to help partners advance from understanding the benefits of investing in NBS for water security to delivering investments on the ground.

Tools like WaterProof, for instance, help partners understand whether nature-based solutions (NBS) are viable options in their watershed by providing an estimated return on investment. Use of this tool can save precious time and money in assessing options at an early stage of project development.

Working with the CEO Water Mandate (established by the United Nations Global Compact), it became apparent that generating additional private investment in nature-based solutions (NBS) is dependent on businesses gaining a more systematic understanding of the full range of benefits that NBS generate— including water quantity, water quality, carbon/

FLORAL KINGDOM

© Roshni Lodhia

climate, socio-economic, and biodiversity and environment—and of their economic and financial benefits. This prompted the creation of the NBS Benefits Explorer to help businesses gain a clearer understanding of the full range of these benefits in a way that is relevant to their activity.

Jointly with the World Water Council, TNC supported the preparation of an Investor Guide that identifies six investment areas or “business lines” for nature-based solutions that are especially relevant to addressing water security risks and appear to offer the most promising models for international replicability, such as constructed wetlands and agricultural best practices. These and other tools, along with decades of field experience, are centralized and easily accessible in the TNC’s Water Funds Toolbox.

TNC also helps partners through tailored training, including for corporate partners whose value chains reach every corner of the world and development finance institutions interested in increasing their investment in nature-based solutions. More than 1,000 practitioners have been trained to date.

To help partners move from theory to practice, the Nature for Water Facility was recently set up as a joint venture between TNC and Pegasys, a consultancy. This facility provides best-inclass technical assistance to project developers looking to include green infrastructure and NBS in developing watershed investment programs, either on a pro bono basis for selected projects or on a fee-for-service basis.

NEXT STEPS: A CALL TO ACTION

For people and nature, the stakes for getting this work right could not be higher. But the good news is that a clear vision and associated tools have been developed to get there. The private sector has a unique and important role to play in helping deliver solutions. Moving into the future, we all must work to understand our unique strengths and commit to working together, continue to invest in NBS and support the development of new tools, resources and technology that will propel us forward. Climate change will not wait. Let’s get to work.

LAGUNA GRANDE

© Nick Hall Celedonia

Notes From the Field

© Roshni Lodhia

Explore the new Tanga Water Fund in Tanzania, which is helping protect the Zigi River watershed for people and nature.

Water Funds in Africa: Going Further Together

JUST THREE YEARS AGO, TNC was leading two water funds in Africa. The goal was simple: showcase how upstream investments in nature could improve downstream water quality and quantity for environmental and community benefit. Today, thanks to the hard work of TNC’s team in Africa and its local partners to prove the value of this conservation model, there are now 15 water funds in progress across the continent—with 70 percent being led by partners.

“People come to us (TNC) because they’ve seen that water funds get results,” said Fred Kihara, TNC’s Africa water funds director. “They (water funds) bring together the public and private sectors to implement naturebased solutions for water benefits, community benefits, biodiversity benefits, and climate benefits. This is the true spirit of Ubuntu: We can go much further together.”

MILESTONE SCALING REGIONALLY

To drive rapid and cost-effective scaling of water funds and other watershed investment programs,

TNC partnered with Pegasys, a South Africa-based water management consulting firm, to create the Nature for Water Facility. Together, we are providing local champions with technical support from an international team boasting expertise in hydrology, ecology, governance, finance and project management.

MILESTONE KENYA

The Eldoret-Iten Water Fund completed the final stages of the two-year development process and officially launched in August. The water fund will focus on the reforestation of three watersheds, alternative economic opportunities for farmers and wetland restoration. The mountainous watersheds are biodiversity hotspots and home to birds like the African crowned eagle and Hartlaub’s turaco.

MILESTONE KENYA

In Kenya’s Upper Tana watershed, soil erosion from 300,000 smallscale farms has been disrupting the water supply for 9 million people. Here, we are working with farmers to achieve a clean and reliable water source, conserving and restoring nature, and generating community benefits. The Upper Tana-Nairobi Water

Fund—the first water fund in Africa—has reached maturity and is now an independent Kenyan charitable trust.

MILESTONE SOUTH AFRICA

In the Greater Cape Town Region, invasive plants “steal” 13 billion gallons from the water supply, crowd out native fynbos plants and threaten the area’s rare freshwater biodiversity. We are working with partners in the Greater Cape Town Water Fund to conduct one of the largest freshwater ecosystem restoration efforts ever undertaken in South Africa. This year, the water fund received a $2.75 million commitment from the City of Cape Town.

ON THE HORIZON

We are co-leading development of three new programs that will make strong contributions to achieving TNC’s Global 2030 Goals: the Kruger to Canyons Catchment Investment Program (South Africa), the Tanga Water Fund (Tanzania), and the Jumuiya Water Fund (Mombasa, Kenya).

A version of this story originally appeared in TNC Africa’s Year in Review, 2022

EVELYNE W. KARANJA

Benefits Flow from New Rain Garden at Philadelphia Church

A 19TH-CENTURY CHURCH in one of the oldest neighborhoods in Philadelphia has been renewed, with a little help from nature.

The Holmesburg Baptist Church and Christian Academy in Northeast Philadelphia, Pennsylvania recently became home to an award-winning green stormwater infrastructure (GSI) project that will reduce on-site flooding and help improve water quality in the Delaware River. Through a collaborative

partnership between the Philadelphia Water Department and Pennsylvania and Delaware Chapter of The Nature Conservancy, the church retrofitted its existing stormwater infrastructure to incorporate two subsurface retention basins, native plantings, and a rain garden. The GSI systems will retain and filter an estimated 1.4 million gallons of stormwater annually, helping to reduce combined sewer overflows in the watershed.

Green stormwater features have become a popular tool for Philadelphia and cities across the U.S. to reduce local flooding and the impact of stormwater on waterways. Impermeable surfaces—think paved roads, parking lots, and rooftops—cover much of the city’s landscape and prevent the absorption of water into the soil below during periods of rainfall, causing runoff and a slew of water pollution issues. The EPA describes stormwater as “one of the fastest-growing sources of pollution” in the United States.

For the Holmesburg community, this GSI project is a win on multiple fronts. The church’s

© Holmesburg Baptist Church

new stormwater systems reduce the amount of harmful nutrients and other contaminants flowing into the nearby Pennypack Creek during storms and helps mitigate flooding at the church. Plus, the rain garden will save the church money on its monthly water bill and establish a habitat for pollinators and native plants.

Cliff Kilbride is a member of the Holmesburg Baptist Church and was an early proponent of the project. “With both the church and myself having such deep roots in this community, this project was a way to give back,” said Kilbride. “By stepping in and doing some small part to help clean up our waterways, we preserve our past for our kids and give them the same opportunity to enjoy

the delights and wonders of nature that we enjoyed as kids.”

Green stormwater infrastructure projects like this are being implemented by TNC across Philadelphia and in cities throughout the U.S. in close partnership with local communities and municipalities. Establishing a network of GSI systems in a city has the potential to capture billions of gallons of stormwater per year. Philadelphia, for instance, has set a goal of capturing and treating upwards of 8 billion gallons of stormwater by 2036. The positive impact these scalable projects have on communities are a testament to their potential to build resilient, sustainable, and beautiful cities where people and nature can thrive together.

FREDI WEITZEL

Holmesburg Baptist Church

By stepping in and doing some small part to help clean up our waterways, we preserve our past for our kids and give them the same opportunity to enjoy the delights and wonders of nature that we enjoyed as kids.”

CLIFF KILBRIDE, Member of the Holmesburg Baptis Church

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Innovative Solutions for Healthy Rivers and Clean Energy

THE CONNECTICUT RIVER is New England’s largest and longest river system. In fact, its original Algonquin name is quinnehtukqut, meaning “long tidal river.” The Connecticut once supported many species of fish and invertebrates, including at least 13 species of migratory fish that traveled hundreds of miles, some from Long Island Sound all the way north to Vermont and New Hampshire. Today, the river supports 13 hydropower projects along the length of its mainstem. The largest of these provide critical stability for New England’s increasingly renewabledependent energy grid. The generation of hydropower, however, has come at the expense of ecosystem health, at times leaving power companies and environmental agencies and organizations at odds.

The value that some of these projects provide to the New England grid comes from their role as “peaking” projects. A peaking hydropower project holds water in a reservoir when energy demand is low and waits to release that water when energy demand is

high. Because energy prices are correlated with demand, peaking can be highly profitable for power companies. However, the resulting rapid and frequent changes from low to high flow extremes can also be detrimental to river ecosystems and the species they support.

This was exactly the case on the Connecticut River. Dr. Katie Kennedy, an applied river scientist for TNC’s North America Region, says that for decades, peaking operations have

Connecticut River © TNC

The Connecticut River solution is a novel strategy that emphasizes the power of sitting down, listening, thinking, and working with all stakeholders—especially those with opposing interests.

disrupted the migration, spawning, feeding behavior and habitats of the river’s native biota, severely compromising the health of the river ecosystem. But because of how important these projects are to the region’s climate change mitigation goals, Dr. Kennedy knew that a solution for the Connecticut River would require out-of-the-box thinking—and a collaborative spirit. Meaningful solutions could only be developed by working with the power companies, not against them.

After many years of learning, researching, discussing and deliberating, the persistence of Kennedy and her partners paid off. In 2020, a modeling experiment conducted by engineers at the University of Massachusetts showed that, due to the volatility of energy prices, hydropower companies make most of their revenue in only a fraction of the hours they typically operate.

This finding led to seventy-two hours of meetings where Kennedy and a group of fellow stakeholders worked with the power company to draft a brand-new operations plan. Under

the new plan, peaking would be limited to only 5% of the hours in a year. For the rest, the river would flow freely, allowing migratory fish to move, freshwater mussels to spawn and tiger beetles to hunt prey without interruption. At the same time, the company determined that they would continue to meet the needs of the energy grid and still maintain 99% of their annual revenue generation—even better than Kennedy and her partners expected.

The Connecticut River solution is a novel strategy that emphasizes the power of sitting down, listening, thinking, and working with all stakeholders—especially those with opposing interests. Kennedy explains that solutions like this are far too scarce in the hydroelectric sector, and that they are needed now more than ever. “It can seem like the hydropower industry is riding the clean energy wave. Sometimes it feels like they’re saying, ‘You can’t touch us because you need us.’ But if we don’t acknowledge the impacts, we won’t find the solutions. And there are solutions. We just have to put in the effort, work together, and use our noggins.”

Where complex conservation issues exist interwoven in the power sector, Kennedy sees opportunities for collaboration. And she hopes her team’s work can serve as an example for how better collaboration can inform more effective, integrated conservation solutions. “Success is only limited by our collective willingness to collaborate and listen to each other.”

Dr. Katie Kennedy, an applied river scientist for TNC’s North America Region

IN CONVERSATION WITH Tara Moberg

We sat down with Tara Moberg, freshwater strategy advisor at TNC, to discuss recent victories for freshwater biodiversity conservation coming out of the 15th Conference of Parties to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (COP15). In her role at TNC, Tara led the development of an international freshwater policy coalition and served as a member of TNC’s negotiating team.

BRIDGE: Let’s start with the basics. What is the UN Convention on Biological Diversity and why was this year’s convening so important?

TARA MOBERG: The UN Convention on Biological Diversity, or COP15, as this year’s event was called, is a regular convening of countries to address global biodiversity challenges. Underpinning the Convention is a 1992 international treaty that guides how nations preserve biodiversity, sustainably use the world’s natural resources, and share the benefits of nature in a fair and equitable way.

The aim of COP15 was for nearly 200 countries that are party to the Convention to agree on a new, 10year Global Biodiversity Framework, which is a roadmap to halt and reverse the catastrophic loss of nature. This particular convening had been delayed more than two years due to COVID-19, so the stakes were higher than ever.

BRIDGE: Can you help us better understand the urgency?

TM: Frankly, the world’s biodiversity is crashing, and we’re running out of time to change course. In the last 50 years alone, monitored freshwater species populations have declined by an average of 83%, and that decline is more drastic for large animals like sturgeon, hippos and river dolphins. We have years, not decades, to bend the curve, and moments like COP15 represent our best opportunities for meaningful, global action.

BRIDGE: What were TNC’s goals going into COP15?

TM: TNC had ten goals for the negotiations, one of which was to ensure the framework and its targets included freshwater ecosystems. Going into COP15, draft targets focused on the protection of “at least 30% of land and seas” by 2030 (or 30x30). Inland waters like rivers, lakes and wetlands weren’t included.

BRIDGE: So, what were the final outcomes of COP15 and what does it mean for freshwater conservation?

TM: Amazingly, after two weeks of negotiations that stretched late into the night, world leaders announced the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, a new 10year roadmap to halt and reverse the loss of nature and biodiversity. This historic agreement broadens

the 30x30 target to conserve at least 30% of the world’s lands, seas and inland waters. Critically, the agreement also centers the rights and tenure of Indigenous Peoples and local communities and was successful in securing financial commitments needed to close the biodiversity funding gap.

BRIDGE: The adoption of a global 30x30 target sounds like a big victory. But what happens from here?

TM: Success rests in the ability of countries, communities, partners and financial institutions to quickly—and thoughtfully—connect global ambition to local action. To facilitate this process, TNC joined The Pew Charitable Trusts, World Wildlife Fund (WWF), and ZOMALAB, the family office of Ben and Lucy Ana Walton, at COP15 to formally launch the Enduring Earth collaboration, which will mobilize $4 billion in public and private funding toward large-scale conservation projects in 20 places by 2030. Connected to this partnership, Prime Minister Trudeau and the Canadian government announced a commitment of $800M to support Indigenous-led conservation initiatives including the preservation of the world’s third largest wetland and second

largest peatland in North America, led by the Omushkego Cree.

There were other bright spots, too, as the governments of Gabon and Mongolia signed national-level commitments to protect 30% of their terrestrial, marine and freshwater ecosystems by 2030, and Australia announced the establishment of a new Brindingabba National Park, which safeguards two nationally important wetlands.

I’m in awe of the leadership demonstrated by the nearly 200 nations that came together in this unprecedented global commitment to biodiversity.

TNC’s work to advance freshwater conservation at COP15 was made possible, in part, by generous support from Enterprise Rent-A-Car Foundation.

This historic agreement broadens the 30 x 30 target to conserve at least 30% of the world’s lands, seas and inland waters.”

© Darren Colello/TNC Photo Contest 2019