The second NATURANCE Festival took place on 3-5 February 2026 in Brussels, Belgium. It united policymakers, researchers, financial institutions, and practitioners to explore insurance and investment opportunities for nature-based transformations.
This event created a platform for communities in climate adaptation, finance, and NbS to exchange ideas and showcased ways to mobilize capital and manage risks via nature-positive strategies, reflecting on lessons from initiatives, project synergies, and scaling pathways.
The World Café session “Communities connect: advancing NbS”
This interactive session brought together participants to foster peer exchange and shared reflection, generating insights on financing and insuring NbS through collaborative thinking. In a World Café format, participants engaged in structured discussions across small, thematically focused tables, each facilitated by representatives from Knowledge Networks or related projects. Moderators included Giada Bastanzi (from our partner Euro-Mediterranean Center on Climate Change), Laurence Drèze (WWF Belgium), Jana Büssing (OroVerde), Callum Ellis (Marsh McLennan), Anna Lea Eggert (World Climate Foundation), and Laura Pirazán Palomar (ICLEI Europe, Session lead).
Key Discussion Topics
- Focused on ARCADIA tool implementation and fund mobilization in partner regions: Emilia-Romagna (Italy), Zagreb (Croatia), and Skåne (Sweden). Questions centered on integrating public funds for NbS, enablers for innovative adaptation finance, and regional/local planning’s role.
- Challenges: mismatched NbS benefits across borders (e.g., flood risk reduction via transnational catchments like Belgium-Netherlands-Germany); preference for large-scale over local projects; land competition with productive uses; lack of NbS standardization favoring grey/hybrid solutions; high upfront/maintenance costs despite CO2 and biodiversity benefits.
Our Arcadia Adaptation Scorecard fueled collaborative insights on structured risk and profitable NbS investments.
Take aways
These interactions advanced our shared goals in nature-positive finance. Explore the full Naturance Festival here.