Background

Our planet faces a triple threat emergency: accelerating biodiversity loss, escalating climate change, and high debt burdens of global south countries that limit their ability to deliver on national priorities.

Despite historic global commitments—such as conserving 30% of land and water and halving emissions by 2030 under the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework and Paris Agreement—critical funding gaps persist. This challenge is amplified as 60% of low-income nations, often the most vulnerable to climate threats, contend with debt distress, severely hindering their capacity for essential conservation and climate action.

Sovereign debt conversions can both reduce debt burdens and generate new funding to improve nature protection and invest in local communities. This innovative approach has already generated significant results, Unlocking more than $1.4 billion in new funding that supports conservation of nearly 3 million square kilometers of ecosystems. Successful deployment of the model has occurred in Seychelles (2016), Belize (2021), Barbados (2022), Gabon (2023), the Galápagos (2023), The Bahamas (2024), and Ecuadorian Amazon (2024).