Nature-based solutions for healthy ecosystems Water – a vital natural resource

    Challenges such as climate change, biodiversity loss, water scarcity and food insecurity cannot be resolved through technology alone. Humans depend on ecosystem services such as carbon sequestration and water storage and filtration. The Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) supports nature-based solutions (NbS) that help to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals of the 2030 Agenda and the international climate and biodiversity goals.

    A man is sitting at an irrigation canal near Qena on the Nile, Egypt.

    Irrigation canal near Qena on the Nile, Egypt.

    Nature-based solutions are actions to protect and conserve, restore and sustainably manage ecosystems, both on land and in the oceans. Nature-based solutions rely on the environmental, social and economic benefits of healthy ecosystem services. These benefits are valuable both for biodiversity and for human well-being, and they strengthen the resilience of societies worldwide.

    In the last few years, the importance of nature-based solutions for sustainable development has been increasingly recognised, and included in various UN resolutions and intergovernmental agreements.


    Water security for people and the environment

    Publication Nature-based Resilience. Confronting the triple planetary crisis of climate change, environmental pollution, and biodiversity loss using freshwater nature-based solutions (NbS)

    Published by: Alliance for Global Water Adaptation (AGWA) and Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ)

    In the water sector, nature-based solutions contribute to the conservation and sustainable management of freshwater habitats and, thus, to water security for people and the environment.

    The BMZ's activities focus on two areas in particular:

    • Protecting intact ecosystems, for instance by designating water protection areas
    • Restoring original ecosystems and their services, for instance by restoring floodplains and wetlands

    Under bilateral development cooperation, the BMZ provides funding, for instance, for projects concerned with climate-smart water resource management, agricultural use of water, and integrated water resources management (IWRM). In addition, it supports multilateral agreements for the protection of ecosystems and is a contributor to various international initiatives, such as the Legacy Landscapes Fund, the Blue Action Fund, the Global Fund for Coral Reefs, the African Forest Landscape Restoration Initiative and the Development and Climate Alliance.

    At the 27th Conference of the Parties to the Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP27) in November 2022, Germany joined forces with the Egyptian COP Presidency and the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN) to launch the ENACT initiative (Enhancing Nature-based Solutions for an Accelerated Climate Transformation). Under this initiative, governmental and non-governmental players want to strengthen global cooperation, pool different approaches and thus make more effective use of the potential offered by nature-based solutions.

    The BMZ also plays an active role in the work on water and healthy ecosystems at UN climate conferences.

    As at: 13/06/2024