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Add to Preferred SourcesThe EIB has signed a 5 million euro loan with CDC Biodiversité, the subsidiary of the French national promotional bank Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations. CDC Biodiversité will use the loan to support the rehabilitation and management of conservation sites around France. This will enable the sale of credits (Unités de Compensation) to clients which are required to offset their impacts on certain habitats and species as a condition of planning permission.
The project is backed by a guarantee from the Natural Capital Financing Facility, under which the EIB and the European Commission are working together to support projects delivering on nature conservation, biodiversity, and climate adaptation.
Signing this new loan at the EU high level conference on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services in Brussels, EIB Vice-President Emma Navarro, who is responsible for Climate Action and Environment, said: “With this project, the EIB in close partnership with the European Commission, for the first time uses the Natural Capital Financing Facility to support the emerging business of biodiversity offsets, which are an important tool in promoting both nature conservation and biodiversity protection and economic development. We are confident that this operation will help mobilize investment, including from the private sector, and scale up finance for such biodiversity compensation schemes.”
More than EUR 400 million of new nature conservation investment is expected to be supported by the EUR 125 million Natural Capital Financing Facility by 2021. The initiative is supported by the European Investment Bank own resources, and a EUR 50m guarantee and a EUR 10m technical assistance from the European Union LIFE Programme.
Original source: EIB
Published on 23 May 2019