Driving a fivefold increase in investments in nature
Canada is well-positioned to be a global leader in nature investment. We have a tremendous opportunity to attract new investors to nature-based activities to help achieve biodiversity and climate goals, while advancing Reconciliation with Indigenous peoples, creating community benefits, and strengthening the economy.
Courtney Kehoe
Director of Partner Engagement
The Nature Investment Hub is driving a fivefold increase in nature investments by championing a conservation finance agenda made for Canada.
Our health, communities, cultures, and economies depend on resilient ecosystems that are threatened by climate change and biodiversity loss. It will take a massive increase in investment–an estimated $20 billion annually–in conservation, restoration, stewardship and sustainable use of nature to change direction. That funding gap is too big for governments and philanthropists to close alone. Flowing in more capital from a wider range of investors is critical, but attracting private finance to nature through traditional investment approaches is challenging.
The good news is financial organizations–from institutional investors to insurance companies–show growing interest in directing capital towards nature. The way to do this is through instruments that offer financial returns alongside environmental, social and cultural benefits.
These conservation finance instruments can create long-term funding streams for Indigenous-led conservation and stewardship, while centering rights and Reconciliation. What’s more, Canada is home to twenty percent of the world’s freshwater, some of the largest remaining tracts of connected intact forest, and globally significant soil carbon stores – presenting a responsibility and opportunity to lead globally.
The Hub curates unprecedented collaboration in the nature investment space, among Indigenous, conservation, philanthropic, private sector, and government leaders.
The Hub champions pilots that can be scaled up, builds business cases, and removes barriers between investors and high-impact nature investment opportunities. It does this leveraging the Smart Prosperity Institute’s cutting-edge research and policy know-how.
At its heart, the Nature Investment Hub rethinks how our systems can properly account for nature’s benefits–today and for future generations.
To learn more, contact Courtney Kehoe, Director, Partnership Engagement: ckehoe@natureinvestmenthub.ca
Canada is well-positioned to be a global leader in nature investment. We have a tremendous opportunity to attract new investors to nature-based activities to help achieve biodiversity and climate goals, while advancing Reconciliation with Indigenous peoples, creating community benefits, and strengthening the economy.
Courtney Kehoe
Director of Partner Engagement
I build relationships, foster awareness, and cultivate shared understanding within and among organizations because I believe this can lay the foundation for transformative solutions beyond what can be achieved alone.
Courtney leads partner engagement at the Nature Investment Hub, a collaborative initiative that seeks to stimulate a fivefold increase in investment directed toward the conservation, restoration, stewardship, and sustainable use of nature in Canada.
Prior to taking on this role, Courtney worked for six years as a consultant with Stratos Inc. – a management consultancy specializing in environmental, social and governance issues. She brings experience working with federal government departments/agencies, private companies, industry associations and Indigenous organizations to advance their goals and achieve their objectives in a number of impact areas – including conservation and nature. She is most known for leveraging her natural ability to cultivate strong relationships and her convening and facilitation skills to ensure space is created for people to feel heard.
In addition to her work as a consultant, Courtney is an owner-operator of a commercial lobster license in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia and brings over a decade of seasonal experience. It is in this experience that Courtney has come to develop a deep appreciation for the need to balance ecological outcomes with economic, social and cultural outcomes, to ensure today’s generation and future generations have equitable access to nature’s benefits.
Courtney holds a Master of Science in Environmental Sustainability from University of Ottawa’s Institute of the Environment as well as a Bachelor of Social Science in International Development and Globalization from University of Ottawa and a Bachelor of Arts in English from Saint Francis Xavier University.
Paige is an environmental scientist whose research focuses on how we account for, make decisions about, and value nature – from a personal as well as economic standpoint. At SPI Paige is leading the conservation finance initiative, examining financial mechanisms and enabling conditions to catalyze interest and investment to support ecosystem services and the natural environment. Her expertise centers around ecosystem services, nature-based solutions for climate change, ecological economics, and environmental and relational values. With a common thread of connecting people and nature, her work has spanned rural agricultural settings in Latin America and South East Asia, to advocating for change in international policy settings, to providing sustainability guidance to private sector actors. In this work and past positions at the Earth Institute in New York City and UNEP in Geneva, she enjoys working with a range of stakeholders to address conservation challenges — including local communities, NGOs, various scales of government, academia, and the private sector. Paige maintains affiliations with the CHANS (Connecting Human and Natural Systems) Lab at UBC, and the Copenhagen Business School as part of the Impact for Innovation Lab. She holds a PhD from the Institute of Resources, Environment and Sustainability at UBC and a Master’s of Environmental Science and Policy from Columbia University.
Innovating and scaling conservation finance solutions in Canada requires a diverse set of groups and sectors to share knowledge and collaborate in novel ways. The Nature Investment Hub is the necessary “connective tissue” designed to forge these connections. We foster awareness and learning, build will and capacity, demonstrate what is possible, and support collaborators to act.
Clean air and water, protection from floods and fires, food security, mental health, jobs. Nature provides indispensable value to Canadian lives and livelihoods, but that value isn’t accounted for in our economic system. Meet three partners working to change that.
Canada is home to twenty percent of the world’s freshwater, some of the largest remaining tracts of connected intact forest, and globally significant soil carbon stores. But when it comes to investing in nature, we’re lagging. What will it take to gain traction?
Read MoreCertain conservation finance instruments are already in play on-the-ground across Canada. Check out the Nature Investment Hub’s interactive map to track progress and gain inspiration.
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