Government subsidies that favor biodiversity by supporting individuals and organizations acting in biodiversity friendly ways. Subsidies can take many forms including tax relief, technical support, price support, etc. This can include biodiversity friendly businesses such as ecotourism, sustainable agriculture, non-timber forest products, reduced impact forestry, fisheries, etc. 

Measurable conservation outcomes resulting from actions designed to compensate for significant residual biodiversity loss arising from project development after appropriate prevention and mitigation measures have been taken. Offsets can, for example, deliver biodiversity benefits (e.g. reforestation) through a transaction, where offset sellers (e.g. a conservation NGO) sell offsets to developers (e.g. a mining company) who seek to compensate the residual biodiversity loss. Offsets have been established in the agriculture, forest, construction, manufacturing and mining sectors. The aggregating of offsets under a policy framework can optimise the biodiversity benefit by increasing ecosystem connectivity, preventing future habitat fragmentation and creating large contiguous sites.

Bioprospecting is the systematic search for biochemical and genetic material in nature in order to develop commercially-valuable products for pharmaceutical, agricultural, cosmetic and other applications. The rationale is to extract the maximum commercial value from genetic resources and indigenous knowledge, while creating a fair compensation system that can benefit all.

The fee charged to the importer of biological material into a country. It can be used to recover the expenditures of the national agency mandated with preventing alien invasive species (AIS), health threats and other agricultural pests from entering certain geographical areas. Mostly used in island states. It can also be part of an import duty or fee.

Incentive mechanism that awards biodiversity friendly behavior or decisions a bonus payment and non-friendly a malus payment. Has been applied on private land owners to encourage establishment of spatially adjacent (or for certain species spatially dispersed) protected areas to existing protected areas by awarding the land owner a bonus payment (or to pay a malus) when the conservation is adjacent to existing protected areas. Oregon's Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program (CREP), used malus payments to assist the recovery of salmon and trout species through the creation of riparian buffers along stream habitat.

Carbon markets aim to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions cost-effectively by setting limits on emissions and enabling trading of emission units (instruments representing emission reductions). Trading enables entities that can reduce emissions at low cost to be paid to do so by high-cost emitters, thus lowering the economic cost of reducing emissions. Carbon markets can include emission allocation credits as well as emission reduction credits such as carbon offset credits. In various carbon markets, forest or agricultural based offset credits may be used to offset industrial emission

Financial or other compensation paid by companies, private individuals, or governments for planned environmental damage as part of infrastructure or project development. Compensation levels and forms of compensation are usually determined by law and can be fixed amounts, calculated relative to investment or company sizes, or based on remediation costs and economic damages.  

A conservation easement is a restriction placed on a piece of property to protect its associated resources. The easement is voluntarily donated, can generate tax credits, or can be sold by the landowner. It limits certain types of uses or prevents development from taking place on the land in perpetuity while the land remains in private hands. Easements protect land for future generations while allowing owners to retain certain private property rights. Conservation easement are traditionally incentivised with tax breaks.

Special commercial products featuring wildlife are sold at an extra price to costumers and the extra revenues are channelled to environmental causes and projects illustrated by the product/item, mostly related to conservation and the protection of wildlife. Examples include, licence plates, special ringtones and screensavers (mobile communication), gifts sold at zoos, etc.

Corporations provide support to organizations implementing sustainable development including nonprofits through direct-giving programs, private foundations, and/or public charities. As well, companies can also offer their employees' time by encouraging employee volunteerism. A foundation can be established as part of a company's corporate social responsibility (CSR) strategy and be funded via the allocation of a percentage of accrued profits, an endowment or other means. Annual giving could range from a few hundreds thousands of dollars to hundreds of millions. They may or may not have a specific mandate or geographic coverage. Some companies and corporate foundations have a focus on biodiversity and conservation.

Special form of government taxation that requires (usually large) companies to spend a percent of their profits every year on corporate social responsibility (CSR) - usually through financing NGOs or paying into government social investment funds. The main difference from traditional taxations is that the companies will be able to decide where to invest and implement programs. This solution has been piloted in only a few countries (e.g. India, Seychelles), with limited documented evidence of its effectiveness relative to other approaches.

The integration of sustainability thinking and practice in business operations helps companies live up to their responsibilities as global citizens and local neighbors and can significantly strengthen business resilience and profitability. Effective corporate sustainability can offer clear business benefits for operations, reputation, new products and markets, and finance and can significantly reduce business risks. A vast literature and international standards can help companies to follow more sustainable business practices.

Numerous cost-effectiveness measures can save money and improve outcomes for government, civil society organizations, and private businesses. Solutions that institutionalize cost effectiveness analysis can be done through regulatory practices, organizational or national policy approaches, and changes in organizational culture or planning practices.

The practice of securing funding for a project or business venture by a dispersed group of people: the crowd. It takes places via online platforms that connect the investor or the donor with the project owner without the intermediation of a financial organization. Different platforms coexist: reward-based where individuals support campaigns and receive some kind of reward in return; donation-based where there is no expectation to receive a tangible benefit; equity-based where individuals invest and receive equity-like shares in return; and lending-based where individuals lend money and expect the repayment of a principal with or without interest.

Through debt restructuring agreements, governments are able to write off a proportion of their foreign held debt. The savings accrued will be channelled into domestic conservation initiatives and climate adaptation programmes. This often entails the establishment of a Conservation Trust Fund to channel the funds. Debt-for-nature swaps can target both official and commercial lending, with the former being the most common scheme.

Insurance schemes that cover– against a premium– financial losses due to extreme weather and natural disasters (i.e. such as earthquakes, floods). If the event occurs, the insurer refunds a percentage of the loss. Insurance is widely used to increase households' and enterprises' resilience to shocks. Forests and other natural assets can be insured.

Increasing the amount of taxes, fees, and other financial revenues derived (or not) from biodiversity related resources that are earmarked (ring-fenced), retained or returned for direct use on sustainable biodiversity management. The retention or return of these revenues can align incentives of various actors, increased funding available, and improve service provision. There is a risk that they produce an incentive to overuse resources for an organization's financial gain. This is often more politically feasible when revenue share partially goes to sustainable development. Examples - PA fees in Galapagos - all go to treasury then 50% back to municipalities, address livelihoods of artisanal fisheries to reduce pressure on biodiversity.

Tax placed on a specific financial transaction, such as the purchase or sale of equity instruments, options and forward contracts, or foreign currency transactions. The revenues obtained maybe earmarked or guaranteed for biodiversity or related spending. For example, a share of the French financial transaction tax will be allocated to the capitalization of the Green Capital Fund. 

Intergovernmental fiscal transfers redistribute tax revenues across government levels-from national and regional to local jurisdictions-according to agreed principles and priorities. Integrating ecological services means including conservation indices (e.g. size/quality of protected areas) in the fiscal allocation formula-thus rewarding investments in conservation and incentivizing the expansion of protected areas, forests or other natural capital.

Cluster of cost-effectiveness measures that can enhance an organization's procurement practices and thus free resources for programming. Typical measures include central procurement, digital procurement, process flow analysis, supplier optimization, green procurement, etc. While not specific to biodiversity, these measures can and should be considered by conservation organizations to optimize their spending practices. The resources saved can be reinvested in conservation.