Belém, Brazil, 18 November 2025 (IUCN) — The ENACT Partnership launched today its Nature-based Solutions (NbS) Accelerator Pathways Report at a high-level event during the UNFCCC COP30 in Belém, Brazil. The event convened ministers, senior government officials, international organisations and civil society leaders to chart a united course for scaling NbS as a cornerstone of global climate and resilience action. A major announcement was the formal entry of Mongolia into the ENACT Partnership.
Global leaders call for integration, coherence, and system-wide transformation
Soha Taher, Egyptian Environmental Affairs Agency, opened the event, emphasising the urgency of moving beyond fragmented climate and biodiversity projects towards integrated, system-level action.
“Nature-based Solutions must move from isolated efforts to coherent, consolidated action,” she said. “ENACT was established precisely to strengthen NbS leadership across international environmental frameworks and to provide the knowledge, policy guidance, and real-world case studies needed to build resilience at scale.”
Mechthild Caspers from Germany’s Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Nuclear Safety and Consumer Protection (BMUKN) highlighted the central role of collaboration:
“Transformative climate action requires not just ambition, but partnership,” she noted. “NbS are a cornerstone of the global climate agenda, and ENACT provides the platform needed to scale efforts, share knowledge, and ensure that local communities—the true stewards of nature—remain at the heart of interventions. Our shared responsibility is clear: we must address today’s challenges with solutions that are inclusive, systemic, and rooted in nature.”
Mongolia joins ENACT: advancing the climate–nature–land nexus
H.E. Mr. Batbaatar Bat, Minister of Environment and Climate Change of Mongolia, announced Mongolia’s official entry into the ENACT Partnership.
“Mongolia is honoured to join ENACT,” he said. “As we prepare to host UNCCD COP30 in 2026, our focus is firmly on the land–climate–nature nexus. NbS are not only about protecting ecosystems; they are about securing a sustainable and climate-resilient future. Mongolia stands ready to champion nature-positive, resilient development.”
He outlined three new national initiatives, including resilient infrastructure, integrating scientific, local and traditional knowledge, and reinforcing the Rio Conventions’ mandates domestically.
A landmark report to drive integrated global action
The newly released NbS Accelerator Pathways Report provides a strategic framework to help countries rapidly integrate NbS into climate, biodiversity, and development planning. It makes clear that incremental progress is no longer sufficient — only inclusive, system-wide transformations anchored in nature can deliver the scale of impact needed to meet global sustainability goals.
Drawing on six interconnected systems — agriculture and food; human settlements; natural ecosystems; green–grey infrastructure; water systems; and energy — the report identifies leverage points across governance, finance, and society that can unlock large-scale impacts. It also features case studies from ENACT partners demonstrating how NbS generate multiple co-benefits across sectors and communities.
Gregory Davies-Jones, Programme Officer of IUCN’s Global Climate Change and Energy Transition Team, who presented the report, explained:
“To evaluate transformative approaches, we looked across the depth, scope, speed, and limits of change. Transformational NbS demand system-wide thinking, backed by coherent governance, innovative finance, and societal participation.”
Integration, not fragmentation, is the path forward
In a powerful address, Carlos Manuel Rodríguez, CEO and Chairperson of the Global Environment Facility (GEF), underlined the consequences of fragmented approaches:
“For decades we treated climate, biodiversity, and land degradation separately — yet all five COPs I have attended are dealing with the same human challenge: unsustainable consumption patterns. This is not a matter of money; it is a matter of coherence,” he said. “Countries still invest 44% more in activities that drive climate change than in efforts to address it. We cannot achieve the SDGs with the same institutional structures that created the problem. We must transform institutions so NbS can truly become the primary approach to tackling global crises.”
Regional and national leaders reinforce the call for coherence
To demonstrate that transformational NbS is advancing, several ENACT partners joined a panel discussion and shared what they have learned from initiatives championed at the national level:
Canada’s Michael Bonser emphasised that advancing NbS is a continuous learning process:
“We have made progress in scaling NbS and climate financing domestically, but more is needed for long-term transformation. We must ensure investments reach territories and communities, and that knowledge flows back to those implementing solutions on the ground.”
Switzerland’s Oliver Wolf highlighted the need to bridge policy and practice:
“Effective NbS scaling requires integrated, cross-sectoral approaches that align policies with real-world implementation.”
From UNEP-WCMC, Najma Mohamed stressed the importance of data-driven, context-specific approaches:
“NbS must make ecological, social, and financial sense. Solutions must be interdisciplinary, grounded in data, and tailored to ecosystems and communities. NbS bring together actors who do not usually work together — but communication, clarity, and operationalisation remain critical.”
From the EU’s Invest for Nature initiative, Zoltan Rakonczay presented early efforts to build investment tools that demonstrate nature as a safe and credible investment target.
“We are learning by doing — gathering disparate cases and turning them into demonstration projects. The goal is to build investment communities capable of comparing opportunities and scaling NbS finance.”
IUCN’s Alain Ndoli, Eastern and Southern Africa Regional Programme Manager for Land Systems, highlighted the challenges many countries face:
“African governments need support to harmonise policies and align national commitments with global goals. Numbers and evidence are essential for decision-makers working to integrate climate, biodiversity, and development priorities.”
A unified vision for COP30 and beyond
The report’s recommendations are structured around four pillars of transformation:
- Setting up for transformational change – embedding systems thinking and adaptive governance
- Policy coherence and governance – aligning NbS with global frameworks while empowering local action
- Transformative finance – mobilising innovative instruments and phasing out harmful subsidies
- Whole-of-society approaches – ensuring Indigenous leadership, gender equality, and participatory governance
Nature at the heart of COP30
The Pathways Report directly supports the COP30 Action Agenda — particularly Axis 2, Key Objective 6, focused on conserving, protecting, and restoring nature — by providing a clear roadmap for integrating NbS into national commitments such as NDCs, NBSAPs, and NAPs.
Ali Raza Rizvi, Director of IUCN’s Global Climate Change and Energy Transition Team, closed the event with a call to collective action:
“We cannot reach global climate objectives without fully integrating biodiversity and nature into our efforts. Through ENACT, we have shown that when diverse actors come together, backed by evidence and committed to shared purpose, we can drive a regenerative, nature-positive transformation that secures a resilient future for all.”
The report arrives at a pivotal moment, as countries intensify preparations for COP30. It aligns closely with the COP30 Action Agenda’s vision of accelerating implementation and advancing cross-convention collaboration. By connecting national commitments under the Paris Agreement, the Global Biodiversity Framework, and Land Degradation Neutrality targets, it illustrates how NbS can bridge policies and practices to strengthen climate resilience and ecological integrity. This reinforces the report’s central message: that nature-based solutions are not standalone interventions, but a unifying framework capable of delivering across climate, biodiversity, and land restoration goals.
Read the full report here.
Read the summary brief here.
About ENACT: The ENACT Partnership, co-led by the Governments of Egypt and Germany and coordinated by IUCN, is a global coalition of more than 25 governments, organizations, and initiatives working to accelerate NbS for climate, biodiversity, and land restoration. ENACT supports the COP28 Joint Statement on Climate, Nature and People and contributes directly to the COP30 Action Agenda by fostering collaboration, aligning finance, and scaling implementation of NbS worldwide.