IUCN Global Standard for NbS

Nature-based Solutions (NbS) are a powerful ally to address societal challenges, such as climate change, biodiversity loss and food security. As the world strives to emerge from the current pandemic and move towards the UN Sustainable Development Goals, it is imperative that future investments in nature reach their potential by contributing to the health and well-being of people and the planet. To this end -- and with growing interest from governments, business and civil society -- IUCN has developed the first-ever Global Standard for Nature-based Solutions to help users design, implement and verify NbS actions.

The second edition is also available to download. This Standard aims to equip users with a robust framework for designing and verifying NbS that yield the outcomes desired, in solving one or several societal challenge(s). Based on the feedback of actual and potential NbS users, it has been developed as a facilitative Standard, purposefully avoiding a rigid normative framing with fixed, definitive thresholds of what NbS ought to achieve. Rather the Standard is designed to support users to apply, learn and continuously strengthen and improve the effectiveness, sustainability and adaptability of their NbS interventions. It also serves as a mechanism for developing a consistent approach to designing and verifying concrete solutions-orientated outcomes. 

By using this Standard and deploying your NbS in a systematic way, the design and execution quality is accounted for and the results can be tracked and linked to global goals as well as research narratives. For individual interventions on the ground, applying the Standard gives tangible added value. Firstly, the result can give credibility to the intervention when speaking to investors, donors and other stakeholders . Secondly, the use of the Standard provides individual interventions with recommendations for improvement, using the results as a way to identify gaps and solutions. Thirdly, the Standard can be used as a means of engagement and communication across sectors, starting new conversations and providing a common framework and language to discuss trade-offs

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