Doubling Down on Nature
The State of Investment in Nature-based Solutions for Water Security, 2025
By Mia Smith, Gena Gammie, Jinsui Song, Brooke Atwell, Daniel Shemie, Michael Bennett, Jose Cuadros Adriazola, Inca Juliet Joubert, and Paola Tanguy View PublicationWater is everywhere in our lives: not just in what we drink or use to grow food, but in data centers, cooling systems, energy grids, sanitation, and manufacturing. It powers our economies and our everyday routines. And in much of the world, water is also the face of climate change. We see it in intensifying droughts, catastrophic floods, and the strain on water infrastructure from rising demand and erratic supply. In fact, not only was 2024 the driest year on record, but it also saw record-breaking floods. These extreme events took lives, displaced communities, and contaminated water supplies. The urgent need to build resilience into our water systems has never been clearer.
As the global water crisis accelerates, many people around the world are turning to nature-based solutions (NbS) to mitigate water risk and recover freshwater ecosystems. With demand for NbS seemingly on the rise, we couldn’t help but wonder: is all the buzz translating into real investment on the ground?
Forest Trends and The Nature Conservancy teamed up to answer that question with our new report, Doubling Down on Nature: State of Investment in Nature-based Solutions for Water Security, 2025. This report builds on Forest Trends’ landmark State of Watershed Investment 2016 and offers the most comprehensive global assessment to date of finance explicitly directed toward NbS with water-related objectives—such as mitigating flood risk, improving water quality, and securing supply.
Among other findings, the data show that investment in NbS for water security is growing steadily around the world. In fact, global investments in NbS for water security have doubled over the past decade, reaching USD 49 billion in 2023. That’s equal to one-third of the financial flows into global biodiversity conservation (as estimated in 2019).
As the authors state, investments in watershed conservation aren’t just gaining momentum, they appear to be some of the most consistent and resilient sources of nature financing around, maintaining momentum even through economic downturns and major disruptions like the COVID-19 pandemic.
This report tracks where finance for these investments is actually flowing, including who is investing, what’s driving growth, and what barriers to scaling remain. Compiled from hundreds of sources globally, including public databases, government reports, survey submissions, and expert interviews, the report shows a growing confidence in nature’s capacity to safeguard freshwater resources and bolster climate adaptation.