Climate resilient landscape finance

Areas of conservation importance are currently under threat from extractive commercial agriculture and urbanization, resulting in loss of biodiversity, fragmentation of land, soil degradation, and often local community livelihoods, as soil productivity reduces. Climate Resilient Landscape Finance (CRLF) is a concessional debt facility that holistically addresses the barriers to expanding sustainable land management in Africa via conservation areas, allowing for the free movement of wildlife, restoration of land and biodiversity, while protecting and strengthening natural carbon sinks and physical climate risk buffers.

CRLF incorporates three synergistic facilities:

• A microfinance facility offering innovative lease-backed loans to local landowners, fostering financial inclusion through preferential terms, supplemented by technical assistance to support the development of sustainable livelihoods and micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), reducing dependence on natural resources;
• A private debt facility offering growth financing to landscape management companies (conservancies) and sustainable agriculture and forestry operators, enabled by technical assistance to build and implement diversified growth strategies while implementing sustainable practices. This will improve bankability;
• A technical assistance facility to support enterprise growth and governance, in part through unlocking access to international carbon and biodiversity markets. CRLF demonstrably meets the Lab criteria for a compelling climate finance instrument: – Innovative: Unique in enabling inclusive, robust, equitable, and scalable conservation centered economies, providing finance to key economic actors through unlocking access to multiple revenue streams and sources of capital.
• Financially Sustainable: Leveraging expert fund management capabilities, portfolio diversification strategies, and targeted technical assistance improving return on investment, CRLF will continuously reduce reliance on grant funding, reinvesting all profits.
• Catalytic: The pilot will catalyze USD 2.5m domestic private capital for a secured sustainable microfinance portfolio, catalyzing investment towards achieving the 30×30 goal in key conservation regions in Africa, including via innovative structured instruments.
• Actionable: Platcorp and proposed strategic partner Conservation International bring a wealth of experience in Kenyan microfinance and conservation finance respectively, whilst Dascot Limited and Conservation Capital bring decades of conservation management and financing experience, investing three years in laying foundations for implementation in Kenyan ecosystems. Immediate next steps will involve formalization of partnerships, legal and operational structure, fundraising for pilot implementation, and establishment of a special purpose vehicle for the facility.

source:

https://www.climatepolicyinitiative.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/CRLF_Instrument-Analysis.pdf