Opinion piece: The way we use our land, or rather, ‘exploit’ our land, is one of the greatest contributors to carbon emissions and extinctions worldwide.
Research by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation has found that deforestation – the complete removal of trees for the conversion of forest to another land use such as agriculture, mining, or towns and cities – has resulted in the loss of one third of our planet’s forests since the last ice age, which was 10,000 years ago. This is approximately two billion hectares of forest, an area twice the size of the United States. Yet, the critically important point is that half of this was lost over the last one hundred years. After a peak loss of primary forests in the 1980s, we lost over 300 million hectares, which is almost the size of India, during the 1990s and 2000s, and about 110 million hectares, an area twice the size of Spain, during the 2010s.
Recognising the critical importance of healthy ecosystems
The environmental impacts of this activity are significant. Firstly, the agriculture, forestry and land-use sectors are responsible for between 13 and 21 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, and the associated deforestation is responsible for about half of this.
Secondly, we know that most of the land-based species that have been documented are found in forests. When these species lose their forest, they are often unable to survive in the fragments of forested land left behind. Over the fifty years between 1970 and 2020, WWF found that there was a catastrophic 73 percent decrease in the planet’s monitored wildlife populations, which is a stark indicator of extinction risk. Though not a direct causal link, it is hard not to recognise a correlation.
To keep global warming below 1.5°C, a key goal of the Paris Agreement, the world needs to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 22 gigatonnes annually by 2030. Under the Global Biodiversity Framework, countries have also agreed to restore 30% of all degraded ecosystems and conserve 30% of land, waters and seas.
Current assessments have us behind on all these targets. Yet, research by the UN Environment Program found that protecting and restoring forests through nature-based solutions can deliver emission reductions and removals of at least 5 gigatons per year by 2030, and at least 10 gigatons by 2050. And forests, which are home to 80% of the world’s terrestrial biodiversity, are one of the best examples of nature-based solutions.
Taking action through nature-based solutions
Distinct from conservation, which is essentially the protection and preservation of biological diversity through setting aside reserves and passing laws, nature-based solutions harness the power of nature to restore and maintain ecosystems in ways that increase their resilience. The underlying idea is that when ecosystems are healthy and well-managed, they provide essential benefits and services to the planet and its inhabitants, including us. Nature-based solutions aim to result in sustainable conservation and climate change mitigation.
All people and organisations are stakeholders in an exchange relationship with nature. We all rely on nature to deliver the services we need to survive and run our businesses and governments. Healthy ecosystems provide us with clean air, water, food, fibre and raw materials for manufacturing and construction, as well as services such as recreation and waste management. Nature-based solutions help provide a mechanism by which we can reimburse nature for these services, rather than simply taking, regardless of the consequences.
GreenCollar began developing, refining and delivering nature-based land management projects, in partnership with landholders in Australia, in 2011. The company’s aim has always been to deliver solutions that can be expanded to scale by attracting private investment so that sustainable conservation is taking place on the vast expanses of privately held land, as well as in reserves.
Focusing on innovation and best practice, GreenCollar’s scientists and technical team have developed government-approved standards that prescribe the way in which these projects are managed. Avoided clearing projects prevent carbon stored in standing forests from being released if a landholder were to otherwise act on their permit to clear their land, while human-induced regeneration projects work to create carbon sequestration by regenerating forest landscapes that have been degraded and suppressed by agricultural activity. Both also act to preserve and rehabilitate habitat. NaturePlus® projects manage land to produce measurable improvements in environmental condition, including increases in species. Reef Credits projects change land management activities in reef catchment areas to prevent fine sediment and nitrogen, from intensive fertiliser use, from entering the waters of these fragile ecosystems.
Investing in measured and verified outcomes
The mechanism by which these projects expand to large scale solutions is through the establishment of environmental markets. GreenCollar’s team is dedicated to innovation and scientific research that drives measurement and verification of the environmental outcomes these projects achieve – there is, after all, no point to this work unless it is delivering real gains to the environment. To this end, the standards require that independent third party experts must verify these measurements before they can be used to generate credits. For example, one tonne of carbon sequestered generates one carbon credit. One kilogram of dissolved inorganic nitrogen prevented from entering a reef generates one Reef Credit.
When organisations purchase these credits for regulatory, nature-related reporting or corporate sustainability purposes, the income to the landholder allows them to assess the viability of running these sorts of projects against conventional agricultural activities. Whereas, under a regulatory approach to conservation, landholders may simply have been required to cease agricultural activity on the land with no reparation. These nature-based projects therefore generate an incentive. Similarly, in countries such as Malawi, income from GreenCollar’s carbon projects not only result in the sequestration of carbon, but educate and incentivise behaviour change among villagers to, for example, cease harvesting native trees for firewood, in favour of having the income to pursue more sustainable practice. An increase in native trees both increases carbon sequestration and increases stocks of these rapidly dwindling species.
The power to drive desperately needed change
Changing the way we use our land is not only the responsibility of those charged with its direct management. Organisational stakeholders that rely on the services our environment provides throughout their supply chains have the power to significantly influence its restoration and sustainable conservation through considered investments in high quality projects dedicated to valuing and repairing vital ecosystems. In this manner, these stakeholders are encouraging concrete steps to reverse the extinction crisis and avoid the worst impacts of climate change.
The bottom line is that world economies need to place value on the environment.
This article was published on the AP News website on 25 September 2025.
