By Maria Damanaki, Global Managing Director for Oceans at The Nature Conservancy

As the world meets for COP, and country leaders, scientists and NGOs like The Nature Conservancy (TNC) play a role in this important piece of global history, I am pleased to be here in Paris to have the opportunity to discuss the critical role that TNC and our partners are playing to find innovative and nature based solutions to combat global climate change.

I am writing to share with you an article I wrote entitled “Can Financial Innovation Make Oceans a Global Climate Solution?”, for a special ocean edition of the Cornerstone Journal of Sustainable Finance and Banking (JSFB) and a  blog for National Geographic Voices. In these articles, I discuss how, while at the Paris COP and in our climate discussions and negotiations, we must consider the value of the ocean as a solution to global climate change.

In these articles that reach out to two different sectors of stakeholders but both important to the success of ocean conservation, I make reference to the important valuation work being undertaken by our Mapping Ocean Wealth initiative, the importance of proper management of our coastal ecosystems, and the significant potential for coastal blue carbon as a climate mitigation tool.

I provided examples of our innovative financing work with reinsurance agency SwissRe and our Seychelles’ debt-for-nature swap to finance marine conservation and climate adaptation.

I hope you will follow the latest news coming out of the COP conference in Paris and share this with your friends and colleagues.  And to our partners working with and supporting us in the Mapping Ocean Wealth arena, thank you for your on-going support of our Ocean work.


Maria Damanaki is the Global Managing Director for
 Oceans at The Nature Conservancy. She leads a global team focused on transforming how the world manages its oceans, including a first-of-its-kind mapping and quantification of the full value of the world’s oceans to people. 

She believes that the only path to lasting, tangible results for a sustainable blue economy is collaboration across public, private and civil sectors – at both global and local levels – while always respecting the needs of both nature and people. Read Maria Damanaki’s Full Biography