A Guide to Buying Credits
Positive Environmental Impact through High-Integrity Credits
An Environmental, Nature or Biodiversity Credit is a certificate that represents a measured and evidence-based unit of positive biodiversity outcome that is durable and additional to what would have otherwise occurred.
Businesses and individuals alike can play a direct role in financing nature-positive outcomes. Through Eco-Markets Australia’s independently administered biodiversity and water quality credits, you’re investing in high-integrity, measurable environmental improvements.
Eco-Markets Australia’s Credits serve as a trusted nature finance mechanism, each representing a rigorously assessed and evidence-based unit of positive biodiversity impact. These credits deliver durable and additional benefits, going beyond what would occur without this targeted support—offering credit purchasers a reliable, impactful way to support a sustainable future while aligning with global environmental goals.
Who Buys Credits?
Biodiversity and Water Quality Credits generated through the programs administered by Eco-Markets Australia attract a diverse range of buyers, from multinational corporations and small-to-medium enterprises (SMEs) to financial institutions, governments, philanthropists, and individuals. Each purchase represents a commitment to meaningful, measurable environmental impact.
How to Buy Credits
To maintain transparency and foster trust, Eco-Markets Australia remains independent of credit pricing negotiations. This ensures that buyers and credit owners can negotiate directly, confident in the integrity and fairness of the market. For more information on credits currently available for purchase or to learn more about the buying process, please contact the Eco-Markets Australia Secretariat team.
The Need for Credits
Closing the estimated $700 billion annual financing gap for nature is critical to halting and reversing biodiversity loss by 2030. For corporates and financial institutions, voluntary environmental credit markets offer a practical mechanism to support biodiversity and nature-positive outcomes. Integrating credits into broader nature strategies can also help businesses mitigate exposure to physical and systemic nature-related risks.
Credits enable organisations to meet growing stakeholder expectations for transparency around nature-related risks and opportunities, aligning with frameworks like the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD). By incorporating credits as part of a comprehensive nature-positive action plan, businesses can unlock added value—from operational efficiencies and enhanced reputation to reduced costs and strengthened investor appeal. Through this commitment, corporate and SME buyers can drive measurable impact while advancing their strategic nature goals.
The Role Credits Play in Global Frameworks
Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF)
As a signatory to the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF), Australia is committed to mobilising both private and public sectors to develop effective biodiversity strategies and action plans to meet critical targets, including:
- Target 2: Ensure that by 2030, at least 30% of degraded terrestrial, inland water, and marine ecosystems are effectively restored.
- Target 3: Ensure that by 2030, at least 30% of terrestrial and inland water areas, as well as marine and coastal areas, are effectively conserved and managed.
- Target 19(d): Increase financial resources, including private investments, to implement national biodiversity strategies, aiming to mobilise at least $200 billion annually. This includes stimulating innovative approaches such as biodiversity offsets and credits.
Taskforce on Nature Related Financial Disclosures (TNFD)
Australia is also a signatory to TNFD, which requires companies to disclose both:
- Nature-related risks: the nature-related physical, transition and systemic risks on a company; and
- Impacts on nature: material nature-related impacts of a company on nature, regardless of whether those impacts pose nature-related risks to the company.
For corporates and financial institutions, demonstrating effective mitigation of nature-related risks and showcasing positive impacts on nature is vital. Investing in high-integrity biodiversity and nature credits is a proven mechanism for companies to achieve these objectives, aligning their operations with global sustainability commitments.
What is a Nature Strategy and Nature Finance Plan?
A nature strategy articulates a corporate commitment to halting and reversing nature loss, aligning with the vision of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework. This strategy outlines the organisation’s ambitions and objectives for enhancing biodiversity and ecosystem health.
To translate this vision into actionable steps, a nature finance plan operationalises the strategy by identifying funding mechanisms and resources required to achieve those goals. Various frameworks, such as the ACT-D framework, provide valuable guidance for organisations in developing robust nature strategies and finance plans, ensuring a comprehensive approach to their nature-positive initiatives.
Business Case for Using Credits:
- Risk mitigation and value creation:
Investing in biodiversity credits helps mitigate exposure to both physical and systemic nature-related risks, providing a strategic advantage for purchasers. By aligning with the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) framework, organisations can create tangible value while demonstrating their commitment to sustainability. Increased productivity due to the activities completed to generate credits is also another important driver.
- Contribution to nature targets:
Purchasing credits enables organisations to meet their specific nature-related targets, showcasing their contribution to the global nature-positive goal. This alignment not only enhances corporate reputation but also positions businesses as leaders in the transition towards a sustainable future.
Corporates and SMEs seeking to assess their current impact on nature within their operations and supply chains should develop a nature strategy using established frameworks such as ACT-D. This foundational step will facilitate the creation of a comprehensive nature finance action plan. Procuring high-integrity Biodiversity Credits is an effective way to demonstrate your commitment to nature finance and achieving nature-positive outcomes related to your business footprint.
A robust nature strategy should set targets aligned with global efforts to halt and reverse nature loss, such as the Global Biodiversity Framework’s 30 by 30 target, which aims for the protection and sustainable management of 30% of global lands and oceans by 2030. This strategy will guide all nature-related actions, including financing initiatives. Funding conservation projects through biodiversity credits can play a vital role in reaching these objectives.
When communicating the use of Biodiversity Credits as part of your nature finance action plan, it is essential to ensure that the messaging is truthful and transparent regarding the nature-positive impacts represented by your credit purchases. For more information on how to effectively communicate the environmental impact associated with each credit, please refer to the Eco-Markets Australia Claims Guidance.
Credits for Investors:
For investors, voluntary biodiversity and nature credits represent a promising opportunity to develop an investable product and a new asset class that aligns with nature-positive transactions. Credits issued under the programs administered by Eco-Markets Australia are tradable, creating a secondary market for each credit before the associated environmental benefits are claimed and the credits are retired.
Eco-Markets Australia only administers high-integrity credit markets
Integrity Guardrails:
- Transparency: Comprehensive and publicly available information on project design and credit issuance is provided, tracked through the Eco-Markets Australia Registry.
- Independent Validation and Verification: All environmental outcomes are subject to validation and verification by approved third-party entities, ensuring objectivity and credibility.
- Monitoring, Reporting, and Verification: Projects undergo rigorous monitoring, reporting, and verification of environmental outcomes, utilising sound scientific methods and transparent metrics.
- Independent Credit Issuance: Eco-Markets Australia operates independently from project development and management to issue credits. To prevent double counting, the Eco-Markets Australia Registry uniquely identifies each credit, facilitating secure tracking and retirement.
- Additionality: All environmental outcomes that generate credits are additional; they would not have occurred without the specific programs in place.
- Durability: Each methodology outlines the durability period of projects and includes measures to manage or compensate for potential reversals.
- Leakage: Project proponents are required to demonstrate any potential leakage risks, ensuring that activities do not displace negative impacts on biodiversity outside the project area, thereby upholding the intended positive outcomes.
Useful Resources
Here are some useful external resources that can help corporates and SMEs understand the requirements and help develop a nature strategy, as well as provide an overview of nature-based market mechanisms:
- Nature Finance and Biodiversity Credits: A Private Sector Roadmap to Finance and Act on Nature – The World Economic Forum
This roadmap outlines the steps an organisation can take to develop and implement a nature strategy and a nature finance action plan. The guide also outlines how businesses can finance nature-positive outcomes through high-integrity biodiversity credits. - State of Voluntary Biodiversity Credit Markets Report – Pollination
An overview of the current Biodiversity Credit Market and the business case for investment. - Nature Investor Toolkit – Responsible Investment Association Australasia
A guide for understanding nature-related risks and opportunities and supporting investors to assess, engage and take action. - Revenues for Nature Guidebook Series – Green Finance Institute
Series of guidebooks on models that can be used to unlock private sector investment into nature restoration, nature-based solutions and conservation. The Water Quality Guidebook features Eco-Markets Australia’s Reef Credits.
Disclaimer: The external resources and organisations listed above are not affiliated with Eco-Markets Australia. Their inclusion in this guide is intended solely for additional reading and reference.