While infrastructure development has played a role in biodiversity declines, sustainable infrastructure is a promising pathway to change this troubling  trajectory and transform humanity’s relationship with the natural world.  

Infrastructure worldwide and throughout history has directly contributed to the climate crisis—accounting for 60-70% of global greenhouse gas emissions through transportation, buildings, electricity production and industrial processes such as cement production and waste treatment.

Incorporating sustainability considerations into infrastructure projects may increase bankability in comparison to conventional infrastructure through lowering  infrastructure projects’ risk profiles and increasing positive externalities and co-benefits.

Economic growth and social mobility are highly dependent from inclusive and gender responsive infrastructure. According to the OECD, applying a gender-lens to infrastructure development would increase the total GDP of its member states by 2.5% until 2050.

Infrastructure investments are a powerful driver to spur economic growth. As they offer new employment opportunities, enable economic activity and improve access to markets and services, they are a common pillar of Green Recovery stimulus packages. 

Nature-based solutions protect, manage and restore ecosystems in ways that address societal challenges effectively and adaptively, in order to provide both human well-being and biodiversity benefits. They can provide more than a third of emissions reductions needed by 2030 to meet the goals of the Paris Agreement.