NbSI announcements

On World Environment Day, we are delighted to announce the launch of NbS Bangladesh. This is a community of researchers, practitioners and policymakers working to enhance understanding of the importance of nature-based solutions and to scale-up their implementation in Bangladesh. The website acts as a hub of knowledge on nature-based solutions in Bangladesh. We [...] Read more Tweet June 3, 2020

The 26th UNFCCC Conference of the Parties (COP26) will be held in Glasgow on 1-12th November 2021. Over 30,000 delegates will convene to agree on actions to address the climate crisis. We need internationally-coordinated action in order to effectively mitigate and adapt to climate change, and the discussions at and during the run-up to COP26 [...] Read more Tweet June 1, 2020

One Earth presents a collection of seven expert perspectives on the role of tree planting for mitigating and adapting to climate change. Among them is NbSI director, Professor Nathalie Seddon.

Some key points include:

– The Trillion Trees initiative requires large investments from governments, ‘shovel-ready’ projects for investment, and robust social safeguards. Long-term tree stewardship with local [...] Read more Tweet May 27, 2020

Together with leading figures from business, climate change policy, academia and environmental NGOs, we have signed an open letter calling for governments and organisations globally to ‘take Nature-based Solutions to scale’ in the wake of the pandemic. The letter highlights the four key guidelines for successful and just nature-based solutions, which the NbS Initiative [...] Read more Tweet May 6, 2020

The Club of Rome have written an open letter to global leaders, calling for the response to the current global health and financial crises to address the other crises we are facing in concert: the biodiversity and climate crises. The signatories recognise that attempts to stimulate the economy in the recovery from COVID-19 could [...] Read more Tweet April 2, 2020

The International Centre for Climate Change and Development (ICCAD) in Bangladesh, which is supported by the Nature-based Solutions Initiative, held a workshop with the Bangladesh Planning Commission to discuss the role of nature-based solutions (NbS) in national development plans. The workshop formally introduced the concept of NbS to relevant government departments, and stimulated discussion of [...] Read more Tweet April 1, 2020

We co-authored a briefing paper for the Net Zero Network looking at the contribution of nature-based solutions and other aspects of land use to achieving net-zero emissions in the UK.

Key points include:

1) Nature-based solutions can be used to increase the size of natural carbon stores and keeping existing stores intact. This is alongside supporting human [...] Read more Tweet March 24, 2020

We talked to Carbon Brief about tree planting in the UK.  If the UK government’s tree-planting targets are achieved, even with optimistic estimates of carbon sequestration they would only provide a small proportion of the total carbon capture required to reach net-zero emissions by 2050. The Committee on Climate Change (CCC) predicts that (with a [...] Read more Tweet March 19, 2020

David Shukman, Science Editor at the BBC, spent a few hours in Wytham Woods talking to Nathalie Seddon about the recent surge of public and media interest in tree-planting. The resulting article specifically looks at UK tree planting targets and raises some valid concerns: 1) The workforce for tree planting at the scale envisaged by [...] Read more Tweet March 18, 2020

Together with Oxford colleagues, Michelle Cain and Michael Obersteiner, Nat Seddon took part in a roundtable meeting at the Palace of Westminster to discuss “Achieving Net Zero: The Role of Land” with the Net Zero All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG). Over the course of two hours, they discussed policy and science issues on what it will [...] Read more Tweet February 25, 2020