The event brought together WBG programs from the Southern Caucasus to West and Central Africa working across forest systems to make the case that protecting and restoring nature was one of the highest-return investments countries could make in jobs, growth, and poverty reduction. Drawing on operational experience, emerging research, and innovative financing approaches, it explored how integrated landscape management could generate employment, build resilience, mobilize private capital, and translate GBF commitments into measurable gains for people and nature, directly embodying the COP17 theme of Taking Action for Nature.

Healthy forest landscapes were presented not only as biodiversity assets but also as economic infrastructure supporting jobs, livelihoods, water security, food production, tourism, and resilience. Drawing on RESILAND Armenia, the Sahel RESILAND Umbrella Program, the Sustainable Congo Basin Forest Economies MPA, and work in the Upper Guinea forest region, the discussion examined how sustainable integrated landscape management could strengthen forest economies, develop durable value chains, and create income and employment opportunities for rural communities. The Armenia experience highlighted ecotourism and non-timber forest products as practical pathways to increasing local value addition, expanding market opportunities, strengthening community participation, and supporting women’s economic opportunities. Experiences from West and Central Africa, home to some of the world's most significant biodiversity-rich and climate-critical ecosystems, demonstrated that investing in the natural infrastructure underpinning sustainable forest economies was as much an economic opportunity as an environmental imperative, with direct benefits for water security, food production, and the jobs and income opportunities that healthy landscapes made possible.

The session explored the enabling conditions needed to scale these approaches, including effective institutions, access to finance, private-sector engagement, stronger markets and value chains, community participation, and credible biodiversity and ecosystem monitoring. Through cross-regional exchange, the event identified transferable lessons for translating biodiversity commitments into investments that supported inclusive economic development, conservation, and landscape resilience.