Approach

‍

Working upstream of mechanism choice

Nature finance is now crowded with instruments and approaches: carbon credits, biodiversity credits, conservation trust funds, blended finance vehicles, jurisdictional programs, water funds, debt instruments, corporate contribution models, and many others. Each can be useful. None is sufficient on its own.

The problem is that initiatives are often pushed toward mechanisms that do not fit or before the underlying system is ready. A landscape may be asked to generate credits before governance is stable, attract investment before revenue pathways are credible, or absorb donor funding before the institutional arrangements are in place to use it well. In those cases, the issue is not simply a shortage of capital. It is a mismatch between the capital being offered and the work the landscape actually needs.

Co-Investing in Nature starts by working with partners to look hard at what the landscape system needs capital to do.

Does it need to strengthen governance? Finance stewardship? Build monitoring capacity? De-risk implementation? Bridge a timing gap? Align multiple funders? Support Indigenous or community institutions? Create a credible claims structure for companies or donors? Or connect existing funding flows so they reinforce one another instead of operating in parallel?

COIN helps partners answer those questions through a structured diagnostic and design process. The goal is to understand the system producing the outcomes, identify where capital is genuinely catalytic, and then design mechanisms that fit the landscape rather than forcing the landscape to fit the mechanism.

The analytical framework behind the practice — including the NbCS Value Chain, Congruence Model for Nature Finance, Claims Ladder, Intermediary Architecture, and Field Intelligence System — provides the toolkit for that work. It gives partners a disciplined way to assess readiness, locate funding gaps, structure claims, align funders, and design mechanisms that can support durable nature-based climate solutions at scale.

This matters because the next phase of nature finance will be less about inventing more instruments and more about making existing sources of capital work together. Public budgets, philanthropy, corporate sustainability funding, carbon finance, concessional capital, and private investment already exist in many landscapes. The hard work is determining what each source of capital is suited to do — and designing mechanisms that let them reinforce rather than undermine one another. 

COIN is not a fund manager, project developer, carbon-credit broker, or standards body. It is a specialist advisory practice focused on the diagnostic and design work that helps those actors — and their funders — deploy capital more effectively.

What nature finance needs to work well

Four conditions have to hold for catalytic funding to do its job. Each is an entry point for the practice's analytical work. The frameworks below are the structured toolkit that does it. 

• Value chain clarity. A realistic understanding of the system producing ecosystem outcomes — governance, community institutions, natural resource management practices, and natural capital — and how they link.
• Finance-approach fit. Finance approaches already exist in most contexts. The work is to assess them, identify gaps, and make targeted adjustments.
• Catalytic gap precision. Which functions do existing flows not close? Where would catalytic funding unlock the rest of the system?
• Mechanisms readiness. The right structure — window, rail, platform, convertible — to move funding into the system effectively, blended with other flows.

‍

Analytical Framework

The five frameworks below test five conditions that have to hold for catalytic funding to do its job in nature-based climate solutions: that the underlying landscape system can actually produce durable outcomes, that the funding approach fits the landscape it is being deployed into, that the claims funders make are bounded by the evidence available, that delivery pathways carry funding without distorting the work it is meant to support, and that the field can see what is happening across initiatives and learn from it over time. 

Each framework addresses one of those conditions. Together they are the analytical foundation for diagnostic and design work across the practice — used to assess where catalytic funding is needed, structure how it is deployed, and keep the system honest as evidence matures.  

The framework is in active use across engagements and provides a structured analytical lens for landscape prioritization, intermediary assessment, and ecosystem-level strategy.

• NbCS Value Chain — Tests whether the underlying system can produce durable outcomes. Maps the governance, stewardship, institutional, ecological, and monitoring systems operating or required to produce durable nature-based climate outcomes. Used to identify where an initiative is strong, where it is underdeveloped, and what kinds of capital are needed to move it forward.
• Congruence Model for Nature Finance — Tests whether the funding approach fits the landscape. Assesses whether a funding or financing approach fits the realities of a specific landscape, jurisdiction, or delivery system. Used to test whether an instrument is appropriate, what risks or gaps it creates, and how the approach should be adapted before capital is deployed.
• Claims Ladder — Tests what funders can credibly say at each stage of evidence. Structures the claims that funders can make as evidence matures — from verified funding, to implementation, to measured outcomes, to broader system-level effects. Used to enable credible claims earlier and to align funder communications with the actual evidence available, reducing integrity risk without waiting for perfect outcome data.
• Intermediary Architecture — Tests how funding reaches delivery without distorting the work. Used to guide design of the institutional pathways that move catalytic funding from contributors to the initiatives, communities, programs, and vehicles that can use it well. Clarifies roles, guardrails, governance, funder requirements, and delivery relationships across complex funding systems.
• Field Intelligence System — Tests whether the field can see what is happening and learn from it. Organizes information on contributions, funded activities, evidence, claims, and outcomes across initiatives and mechanisms. Used to improve transparency, track learning over time, and support credible reporting without turning every contribution into a tradable credit.