What is needed to address the financing gap for nature?

The presentation highlighted the large global financing gap for nature and showed how WWF and ADB had worked to mobilize funding for conservation. It outlined WWF’s strategy to finance green projects and align financial systems with global climate and nature goals, using examples from Borneo to demonstrate practical applications. It concluded that scaling nature investments required coordinated policies, stronger financial mechanisms, and mainstreaming natural capital in existing financial instruments.

Tracking ADB’s portfolio on Environment and Nature

The presentation explained how ADB tracks its environment and nature portfolio under the new Corporate Results Framework. It outlined the Strategy 2030 midterm priorities, the updated outcome-oriented indicators, and the tools and resources used for reporting environment-related results. The slides also highlighted ADB’s current environment-tagged portfolio, upcoming revisions to nature finance tracking standards, and key steps toward preparing the 2026 Sustainability Report.

Ben Furmage

Ben is the founding CEO of Water Sensitive Cities Australia, continuing his work from his time as CEO of the Cooperative Research Centre for Water Sensitive Cities (CRCWSC), where he also served as the Chief Operating and Finance Officer. He leads multidisciplinary projects on water-sensitive city approaches. Before CRCWSC, Ben spent ten years on Melbourne Water’s executive team, handling water resource and sewerage system planning, regulation, customer service, public affairs, and research and development.

Lyndon DeSalvo

Lyndon works to advance NBS in cities and communities to maximize outcomes for people and nature. He leads efforts to implement and scale nature-based and green infrastructure projects that improve water quality and provide local communities with climate resilience and other co-benefits. He collaborates closely with government agencies and the water sector, including utilities, researchers, and policymakers. Lyndon is a city and environmental planner who can work at multiple scales, from watershed-wide planning to site-specific design.

Erik Spiro-Larrea

Erik is a senior project lead for TNC’s Nature for Water Facility, a specialist team that helps local programs analyze, develop, and execute NBS for water security. Erik led Nature for Water’s first project and has since directly supported 15 NBS programs worldwide with various detailed analyses. As a trained economist, he typically focuses on return on investment, economics, sustainable finance, and governance, as well as developing “program intelligence” analyses and dashboards. Before joining TNC, Erik worked at Pegasys, a management consultancy based in Cape Town.