Across the board, scientists, economists and policymakers increasingly recognize the linkage between climate, nature, and our economies. This is clearly reflected in the World Economic Forum’s 2025 ranking of the top global economic risks over the next decade, which lists Extreme Weather Events first, followed by Biodiversity Loss and Ecosystem Collapse, Critical Changes to Earth Systems, and Shortages of Natural Resources. Similar work by central banks, commercial banks, and other finance institutions likewise shows significant climate- and nature-related risks. 

With this linkage becoming ever more evident, our response needs to similarly connect these key development issues. UNDP has made significant efforts to develop and deliver a nexus offer on the climate and nature agenda, focusing on the delivery of integrated national solutions that simultaneously achieve globally agreed goals on climate, biodiversity, and land degradation. This builds on UNDP’s flagship initiatives—the Climate Promise and the Nature Pledge—which work across 150 developing countries to support concrete solutions through a $5 billion portfolio of nature and climate initiatives. 

At the heart of this nexus is the need to align and accelerate finance to drive integrated action responding to the objectives of FfD4 outcome under the Sevilla Platform for Action, the Paris Agreement in the lead-up to COP-30 in Belem, as well as the Convention on Biological Diversity. There is a clear economic rationale for integrating climate, biodiversity, and development finance strategies within a joint framework:  

• $500 billion per year is the combined nature and climate finance target under the Paris Agreement and the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework. In terms of reducing environmentally harmful subsidies.
• 55% of global GDP (US$58 trillion) is moderately or highly dependent on nature. 

The new report by UNDP and OECD titled Investing in Climate for Growth and Development – The Case for Enhanced Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) provides evidence that accelerating climate action makes economic sense: enhanced NDCs could sustain 60% global GDP growth by 2040 compared to 2022 levels.  

When bold nature-climate actions align with SDG-driven policies, 175 million people can be lifted from extreme poverty by 2050—improving the lives of one in three households currently in extreme poverty. Investing in biodiversity is one of the most cost-effective ways to advance sustainable economic development while closing the financing gap on both nature and climate.   

The starting point for advancing this integration is a policy framework that recognizes the linkages. Increasingly, policy coherence across climate and biodiversity linked to the global conventions is gaining traction, in countries supported by UNDP: 

• 67 countries are working on NBSAPs that reference climate targets from NDCs
• 43 countries are developing NDC 3.0 with prominent links to nature and NBSAPs.
• 40 countries are developing Biodiversity Finance Plans with climate aspects. 

Furthermore, translating these policies forward into concrete action requires integrated financial planning. UNDP supports over 85 countries with Integrated National Financing Frameworks (INFFs)—positioned as a key mechanism for aligning finance with NDCs, NBSAPs, and SDGs to deliver them simultaneously. Across 20 countries, these processes have already explicitly incorporated NDCs, while influencing public finance reform, private capital mobilization, and SDG and/or climate budgeting across all regions with a green lens. For instance: 

• Egypt’s INFF aligns its updated NDCs and Vision 2030 by prioritizing green public investment, climate-budget tagging, and private sector mobilization across key sectors such as energy, transport, and agriculture. The strategy includes developing a climate fiscal risk register by 2025 and applying a climate-tagging system to public budgets.
• The Maldives is implementing gender-responsive climate financing reforms, phasing out fossil fuel subsidies, boosting energy transition investments, and enhancing sustainability reporting rules for the private sector. 

Moreover, practical financing innovations for biodiversity which yield climate benefits are evident in  

• In Thailand (Koh Tao), a visitor fee to a national park of under $1 has generated over $300,000 to reinvest in the restoration of coral reefs and improvements in waste management, which supports climate resilience through nature conservation;
• In Botswana revised protected area fees increased annual revenue by $7 million which went back to local communities to help build resilience and livelihoods; and
• Ecuador’s green microfinance has mobilised $804 million for small- medium entrepreneurs, particularly women, youth, and rural SMEs, working on the intersection of nature and climate change, such as renewable energy solutions.   

To scale this momentum, UNDP has launched the Sevilla Platform for Action on “Integrated Finance for Development, Climate and Nature.” This initiative aims to elevate global advocacy and generate knowledge on the economic opportunities of linking climate, nature, and development policy and finance. It provides a strategic platform to consolidate evidence, build partnerships, and scale integrated financing solutions aligned with global development goals and the Financing for Development agenda. 

At the same time, this will go beyond public finance alone to advance blended opportunities. Through matchmaking platforms, green taxonomies, and finance maps, the integrated finance approach championed through this Sevilla Platform for Action will help channel over $1 billion in public-private investments towards climate, nature and SDG outcomes by 2027. These tools, along with blended finance and nature-based solutions, enhance investment readiness and unlock private capital.  

In closing, the alignment of biodiversity and climate finance not only present immense opportunities to address the planetary triple-crisis more efficiently, it also makes economic and financial sense and de-risking investments in development.