According to a UN report, considerably more money flows into the destruction of nature than into nature conservation. The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) is calling for a turnaround.
If it were only a game about money and nature stood up against its exploitation, the score would be: 1 point for Mother Nature and 30 points for the plundering. Final score: 1 to 30.
But it is not a game; it is reality: For every one US dollar invested in preserving nature, 30 US dollars are invested in its destruction. This balance is drawn by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) in a report presented on Thursday in Nairobi. It says it is time to reverse course. The report, now in its fourth edition, is based, according to UNEP, on improved data sets and methods for tracing financial flows, in this case for 2023.
Financial institutions, loans, or investments played an important role in the preservation or destruction of nature, says Tina Lutz, forest and trade expert at Deutsche Umwelthilfe. “We need binding rules that ensure environmental and human rights are not violated by their financial activities.”
The UN report shows: in 2023 investments in nature significantly missed their target. That is, the amount needed to curb the climate crisis, the extinction of species, and the destruction of ecosystems. In that year nearly $220 billion were invested in nature conservation, most of it from public budgets – 4 percent more than in 2022. And yet: $2.4 trillion flowed as subsidies into the destruction of nature – especially into fossil fuels or environmentally harmful agriculture.
Sustainable Cultivation of Coffee, Palm Oil, or Soy
Private investments that cause destruction and degradation of nature are more than twice as high: $4.9 trillion. According to UNEP, environmentally harmful funds flowed especially into the utilities, energy, industry, and raw materials sectors.
Financial institutions play an important role in the preservation or destruction of nature
Tina Lutz, Deutsche Umwelthilfe
UNEP concludes that by 2030 annual investments in nature conservation would need to rise to $571 billion to achieve a turnaround – for example through sustainable cultivation of coffee, palm oil, or soy. This would amount to only about half a percent of global economic output. For now, nature has lost against its exploitation. The score can still change.
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