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Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
Biodiverse Landscapes Fund
Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs
The UK’s £100 million Biodiverse Landscapes Fund (BLF) aims to reduce poverty, protect and restore biodiversity and lessen the impact of climate change in six environmentally critical landscapes across the globe. These are: - The Kavango-Zambezi (KAZA) Transfrontier Conservation Area, covering areas of Angola, Botswana, Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe. - Mesoamerica, covering areas of Belize, El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras. - Western Congo Basin, covering areas of Cameroon, Gabon and Republic of Congo. - Andes Amazon, covering areas of Ecuador and Peru. - Lower Mekong, covering areas of Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam. - Madagascar. The BLF has 3 core aims: - people: to develop economic opportunities through investment in nature in support of climate adaptation and resilience and poverty reduction. - nature: to slow, halt or reverse biodiversity loss in globally significant regions for biodiversity. - climate: to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and safeguard natural carbon sinks. It will meet these aims by: - reducing poverty and creating sustainable economic development for communities living in, and dependent upon, environmentally precious landscapes. - protecting and restoring ecosystems and biologically diverse landscapes helping to mitigate climate change by preserving carbon sinks and ecosystems. - addressing the causes of environmental degradation. - supporting national and local governments, park authorities and communities to achieve long-term sustainable management and use of natural resources Funding will be distributed across the landscapes according to demands and needs.
Annual contribution to the European and Mediterranean Plant Protection Organisation (EPPO)
Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs
This UK Government contribution is for EPPO which is an intergovernmental organization responsible for cooperation in plant health within the Euro-Mediterranean region. Founded in 1951 by 15 European countries, EPPO now has 52 members (shown in green on the map). Its objectives are to protect plants, by developing international strategies against the introduction and spread of pests which are a threat to agriculture, forestry and the environment, and by promoting safe and effective pest control methods. Following the terms of the International Plant Protection Convention (IPPC), EPPO is a Regional Plant Protection Organization and thus participates in global discussions on plant health. EPPO is a standard-setting organization which has produced a large number of Standards in the areas of plant protection products and plant quarantine. These Standards constitute recommendations that are addressed to the National Plant Protection Organizations of EPPO member countries. Finally, EPPO promotes the exchange of information between its member countries by maintaining information services and databases on plant pests, and by organizing many conferences and workshops.
Funding to build capacity and support cross-border action on the conservation of wildlife within countries in the Kavango Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area (KAZA TFCA)
Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs
The funding will be used to support KAZA countries to develop African-led trans-frontier approaches to support conservation of wildlife, including iconic species such as elephants through efforts in integrated land-use planning, human-wildlife conflict mitigation, community livelihoods and illegal wildlife trade. This funding will be used to provide technical assistance and build capacity within the KAZA countries to address areas for immediate action, provide a foundation for future work programmes and support access to wider funding options.
Annual contribution to the United Nations Environment Trust Fund of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES)
Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs
This activity supports an annual UK contribution to the IPBES. IPBES is a science-policy platform providing comprehensive, credible and legitimate scientific knowledge about Earth’s essential life support systems and their contribution to human well-being; as well as tools and local capacity to help decision makers around the world identify solutions to pressures on ecosystems, sustainable use of natural resources and related poverty. Contributions to the IPBES Trust Fund are used to meet the running costs and support developing country expert engagement in delivering the work programme agreed by member governments at the Plenary meetings.
Land Degradation Neutrality Fund
Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs
The LDN Fund invests in projects which reduce or reverse land degradation and thereby contribute to ‘Land Degradation Neutrality’. The LDN Fund is co-promoted by the Global Mechanism of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) and Mirova. It is a public-private partnership using public money to increase private sector investment in sustainable development. The fund invests in sustainable agriculture, forestry and other land uses globally. The Fund was launched at the UNCCD’s COP 13 in China in 2017.
Global Programme on Sustainability
Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs
The programme supports sustainable economic growth that is both long-lasting and resilient to climate-related stressors. It does this through the integration of natural capital into decision making by governments, the private sector and financial institutions. The inability to value natural capital can undermine long-term growth and critically, the livelihoods of the poorest people dependent on ecosystems for their livelihoods. This programme directly addresses this challenge by (i) investing in data and research on natural capital; (ii) assisting countries to integrate this analysis into government policy making; and (iii) integrating this data and analysis into financial sector decision making.
Sustainable Cooling and Cold Chain Solutions
Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs
This activity supports a number of different areas of work which aim to accelerate the climate benefits of the Kigali Amendment (KA) to the Montreal Protocol (MP) and encourage uptake of energy efficient and climate friendly solutions. This includes (1) The creation of an African Centre of Excellence for Sustainable Cooling and Cold Chains (ACES) in Rwanda. ACES will accelerate deployment of sustainable (environmental, economic and social) cold-chain solutions throughout Africa. (2) The development and deployment of an HFC outlook model to address information gaps on energy use and energy related CO2 emissions from the refrigeration, air-conditioning and heat pumps (RACHP) market. It will assist in reducing cost of the transition for Article 5 countries to the Montreal Protocol and increase the climate benefit of action under the MP. (3) Increasing countries technical capacity and providing insights on global best practice of EE improvements of cooling products in parallel with HFC phase down, through model regulations and sustainable public procurement in ASEAN and Africa.
A contribution to Financial Sector Deepening Africa (FSDA) the United Nations Development Programme Biodiversity Finance Initiative (Biofin) to support delivery of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework.
Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs
The programme will support low and lower-middle income countries to grow their economies in ways that help to protect and restore their natural capital and so drive sustainable economic development. It is designed to provide practical support to governments, businesses, and financial institutions to integrate nature into their economic and financial decision-making, understand and manage nature-related risks, and capitalise on growing opportunities to invest in their natural assets. As such, it will support low and lower-middle income countries to transition to nature positive, net zero economies and so protect the poorest communities. Through an integrated set of activities, the programme will deliver the following outcomes: • Private Sector Disclosure Readiness: private sector actors in low and lower-middle income countries – including financial institutions, businesses, and policy-makers - will have the tools they need to understand and manage nature-related financial risk. In particular, the programme will ensure that key institutions have the tools and capacity to respond to growing demand to disclose nature-related financial risk. • Integrating nature at country level: governmental and regulatory decision-makers in low and lower-middle income countries will have the knowledge, skills and data to design and implement policies and programmes that will help to manage nature-related risks, unlock new nature markets, and rebuild natural capital. • Action Plans for Nature: partner governments will develop clear and comprehensive plans to finance the protection and restoration of nature. These plans will act as platforms to mobilise and guide both public and private financial flows. • Evidence Sharing Mechanisms on Nature: better evidence will be available to, and used by, decision makers in low and lower middle-income countries to guide their work. The programme will help to build the evidence about how to best integrate consideration of the natural environment into economic and financial decision making. It will also help decision-makers in governments and the private sector to access and use that evidence easily by building communities of practice and robust approaches to sharing knowledge and information. The outcomes will support the implementation of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (KMGBF), agreed at the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) meeting COP15. As protection and restoration of critical ecosystems is also critical to tackling climate change, it will also support the UK goal to keep global temperature rises within 1.5c degrees.
Ocean Community Empowerment and Nature (OCEAN)
Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs
The Ocean Community Empowerment and Nature (OCEAN) Grants Programme is a competitive grants scheme to support projects that aim to deliver lasting change to the marine environment and coastal communities. The programme is funded through Official Development Assistance (ODA) as part of the UK’s £500 million Blue Planet Fund. In the last 10 years, less than 1% (around USD ~$13 billion) of the total value of the ocean has been invested in sustainable projects, even though the ocean supports the livelihoods of 1 in 10 people globally. OCEAN seeks to redress this imbalance and support people and communities who have most acutely and disproportionately been impacted by climate change. Organisations including Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) and Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) can submit applications for funding to deliver projects in ODA eligible countries. There are two pots of funding available to bid for, with a smaller pot of up to £250,000 being targeted for small scale, local, in-country organisations and a larger one of up to £3 million to support organisations that can fund large-scale activities and scale up effective solutions. OCEAN directly supports the International Development Strategy, which emphasises the necessity of localising ODA. The fund’s long-term objective is to increase the capacity of local organisations to drive equitable and inclusive decision-making, which will in turn enable communities to manage and benefit from marine ecosystems sustainably. An investment of up to £60 million for OCEAN was announced by the Environment Secretary, Steve Barclay, in December 2023 at COP28 in Dubai.
GEOGLAM - UK Contribution to The Group on Earth Observation's Global Agricultural Monitoring Initiative is to increase market transparency and improve food security.
Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs
The purpose of Group on Earth Observations Global Agricultural Monitoring Initiative (GEOGLAM) is to increase market transparency and improve food security by producing and disseminating relevant, timely, and actionable information on agricultural conditions and outlooks of production at national, regional, and global scales. It achieves this by strengthening the international community’s capacity to utilize coordinated, comprehensive, and sustained Earth observations. GEO is an intergovernmental organisation that works to improve the availability, access and use of earth observations (EO) globally, primarily targeted at the sustainable development goals (SDGs), Paris climate agreement and the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction. The GEOGLAM policy mandate initially came from the Group of Twenty (G20) Agriculture Ministers during the French G20 Presidency in 2011. The mandate has expanded parallel to the G20 mandate to include food security concerns and we now work to support early warning for international agency response to emerging food emergencies. GEOGLAM has produced Stocktaking reports for the G20 in recent years. These reports are available for 2021, 2022 and 2023. GEOGLAM is working on a response to the three big policy drivers of our time: UN Sustainable Development Goals; the Paris Accord on Climate Change; and, the Sendai Framework on Disaster Risk Reduction. Through the development of quantified metrics GEOGLAM will be able to work with other science communities and statistical agencies to develop policy relevant information in support of sustainable food production. GEOGLAM is a Group on Earth Observations (GEO) Flagship Initiative.
International Consortium on Combating Wildlife Crime Strategic Vision 2030
Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs
The Illegal wildlife trade (IWT) is a lucrative transnational crime which undermines governance, fuels corruption, creates instability, threatens species with extinction and deprives some of the world’s poorest communities of sustainable livelihoods. The International Consortium on Combatting Wildlife Crime (ICCWC)’s Strategic Vision 2030 programme involves a global collaborative effort of inter-governmental organisations, which aims to create a fit for purpose law enforcement and criminal justice system that effectively addresses wildlife crime. The ICCWC Vision 2030 programme will guide ICCWC interventions through a series of targeted approaches to achieve the five outcomes: 1) reduced opportunity for wildlife crime, 2) increased deterrence of wildlife crime, 3) increase detection of wildlife crime, 4) increase disruption and detention of criminals, and 5) evidence-based action, knowledge exchange and collaboration. Defra’s funding will contribute towards delivering the interventions for outcomes 3, 4 and 5. Implementation of activities will develop capacity within, and provide support to, wildlife authorities, police, customs, and justice systems in strategically important developing countries, to ensure that they effectively respond to and address wildlife crime. The strategy shifts involvement in the IWT to a high-risk low-reward environment. Reduced IWT will help alleviate poverty, biodiversity loss and climate change. The collaborative global working of ICCWC combines partners with diverse and extensive experiences and brings together countries impacted by IWT to yield more effective results in addressing wildlife crime.
Low-carbon Agriculture for avoided deforestation and poverty reduction Phase II (Rural Sustentavel)
Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs
As a follow-up phase to a similar ICF intervention in Brazil, Rural Sustentável aims to promote low-carbon agriculture (LCA) on small and medium-scale farms to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions through avoided deforestation, enhance producers’ income and quality of life, increase the adoption of sustainable practices, and foster policy replications in Brazil and abroad. The programme operates through three distinct projects in separate Brazilian biomes: PRS Amazon, PRS Cerrado, and PRS Caatinga. Each project has its own budget, implementing agency, timelines, and activities but despite their differences, all three projects share a common theory of change: by providing small- and medium-scale farmers and landowners with alternative methods of production and income generation, the rate of deforestation can be significantly reduced.
Darwin Initiative
Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs
The Darwin Initiative is the UK’s flagship international challenge fund for biodiversity conversation and poverty reduction, established at the Rio Earth Summit in 1992. The Darwin Initiative is a grant scheme working on projects that aim to slow, halt, or reverse the rates of biodiversity loss and degradation, with associated reductions in multidimensional poverty. To date, the Darwin Initiative has awarded more than £195m to over 1,280 projects in 159 countries to enhance the capability and capacity of national and local stakeholders to deliver biodiversity conservation and multidimensional poverty reduction outcomes in low and middle-income countries. More information at https://www.gov.uk/government/groups/the-darwin-initiative. This page contains information about Rounds 27 onwards. For information about Rounds 1 to 26, please see the Darwin Initiative website -https://www.darwininitiative.org.uk/
Darwin Plus
Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs
Darwin Plus is a UK government grants scheme that helps deliver long-term strategic outcomes for the unique biodiversity, the natural environment and improving resilience to climate change within the UK Overseas Territories. It also also provides funding to build capacity through training and education opportunities for UKOT nationals. Part of Darwin Plus is ODA funded to support Overseas Territories Montserrat, St Helena, Tristan da Cunha and Pitcairn Island. This page contains information about Main Rounds 10 onwards and Darwin Plus Local 1 onwards. For information about previous Rounds, please see the Darwin Plus website -https://darwinplus.org.uk/
Blue Planet Fund
Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs
The UK launched the £500 million Blue Planet Fund in 2021. Financed from the UK aid budget, the Blue Planet Fund is a portfolio of marine ODA programmes that support developing countries to reduce poverty, protect and sustainably manage their marine resources and address human-generated threats across four key themes: biodiversity, climate change, marine pollution, and sustainable seafood. The Blue Planet Fund is jointly managed by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) and the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO). The programmes led by Defra are managed by the International Sustainable Blue Finance Team. The Blue Planet Fund supports programming in ODA - eligible coastal countries across the following 6 priority regions: - South and Southeast Asia - West Africa - East Africa - Latin America - Caribbean Small Island Developing States (SIDS) Pacific SIDS For more detailed information about our programmes please visit: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/blue-planet-fund/blue-planet-fund Or refer to the individual pages within: https://devtracker.fcdo.gov.uk/
Championing Inclusivity in Plastic Pollution (CHIPP)
Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs
Championing Inclusivity in Plastic Pollution (CHIPP) comprises two components: (1) £1.6m contribution for the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)’s Tide Turners Plastic Challenge (TTPC) (2) £2m contribution to the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee on Plastic Pollution (INC). CHIPP’s overall objective is to foster an inclusive approach to tackling plastic pollution at all levels in ODA-eligible countries, from young people and communities to international action. TTPC is a youth environmental education and advocacy initiative which seeks to educate and empower young people on marine plastic pollution and how they can address it in their communities. The objective of this programme is to influence behaviour change, share knowledge, build awareness, and promote inclusive environmental stewardship in young people and give them a voice in the fight against plastic pollution. Its core deliverable is an educational course delivered in partnership with educational institutions. The INC contribution supports the inclusive participation of ODA-eligible country negotiators in the agreement of an international legally binding instrument (ILBI) on plastic pollution by providing travel support and facilitating regional intersessional meetings.
Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) Fund Investment
Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs
The Global Biodiversity Framework Fund (GBF Fund), is a competitive, international nature fund to support ODA-eligible countries to implement the goals and targets of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (KMGBF), by providing project funding to protect and enhance biodiversity. It will support the development and implementation of sustainable biodiversity-based products, services and activities that enhance biodiversity, to generate social, economic and environmental benefits. Investments are pooled and the GBF Fund is designed to maximise additional finance leveraged from the private sector to further boost investment to biodiversity and create sustainable financial flows.
The eco.business Fund
Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs
The eco.business fund is a public-private partnership investment fund which aims to shift incentives in financial institutions (i.e. Banks) towards investing in nature, by embedding social and environmental risk into investment decisions, catalysing transformational change in the financial sector. The fund will increase lending to businesses which incorporate sustainable practices that contribute to biodiversity conservation, sustainable use of natural resources, climate change mitigation and adaptation to its impact across South America: Ecuador, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Colombia, Panama, Honduras, Guatemala, Mexico and Peru.
The Initiative for Sustainable Forest Landscapes (ISFL) - Bio Carbon Fund
Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs
A multilateral project administered by the World Bank which aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the land use sector through sustainable landscape management, whilst improving the livelihoods of forest communities. The ISFL combines upfront technical assistance with results-based finance which rewards countries which implement landscape-level approaches that reduce emissions from the forest and land-use sector. ISFL works with 5 countries: Colombia, Indonesia, Ethiopia, Mexico and Zambia. Defra is supporting programmes in Indonesia and Zambia with upfront finance and potentially all countries with results based finance.
Achieving sustainable forest management through community managed protected areas in Madagascar
Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs
This project aims to reduce deforestation and forest degradation within Madagascar’s national park network by supporting community and regional authorities to manage and monitor natural resources more effectively. It also seeks to transform the way in which communities use the forest by investing in sustainable farming practices and alternative livelihoods. By demonstrating proof of concept for community-based forest management, this project seeks to help communities to attract new investment and access market-based opportunities that guarantee the long-term financial sustainability of the protected area network. In this way, the project aims to create a successful model that could be replicated across the protected area network.
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