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Investing in Natural Infrastructure: Restoring Watershed Resilience and Capacity in the Face of a Changing Climate

With changing climate conditions and intensified human use, the natural infrastructure provided by healthy, functioning watersheds—wetlands, soils, watercourses, aquifers, and floodplains—is currently under threat of loss at an unprecedented global scale. To meet the challenge, a step-change in investment and attention is needed by society to restore the natural capacity and resilience of watersheds so that present and future generations may enjoy the goods and services they provide. Losing the natural infrastructure associated with watersheds can weaken resilience to rapidly changing climate conditions and ultimately hinder economic development and human well being. Yet, natural infrastructure is widely overlooked when it comes to investment decisions; it is the built infrastructure—dams, reservoirs, and flood barriers—that tends to be given precedent by markets, investors, and policy makers. The challenge is to uncover, and bring to the foreground of awareness, the underlying value of natural infrastructure so that better decisions may be made and resources allocated.