Catalytic Conservation Finance Platform
A Catalytic Conservation Finance Platform would make it easy and inexpensive to launch regional, topical or programmatic revolving loan funds to finance land acquisition and protection, habitat restoration, water projects, regenerative agriculture practices, nature based solutions and other climate resilience initiatives.
We have been in conversation with several groups around the country that have strong interest in launching revolving loan facilities on a platform built in partnership with the impact community. Such a platform would be an innovative solution to the lack of readily available, low-cost financing needed to achieve conservation and community impact. Given the strong support these groups enjoy from their donors, we believe each could raise $5-$10 million or more upon launch of their respective loan fund.
Full spectrum capital allows philanthropic capital to be reused for multiple deals over time.
The design of the platform has been informed by our conversations with land trusts, regional partnerships, individual donors and foundations that are interested in serving as regional, local and topical fund co-creators on the platform. Each group has expressed their desire to create individually branded place-based or programmatic revolving loan funds that will provide their targeted users with access to low-cost bridge loans. In addition, the Lyme team has shared that a number of intermediaries with strong community and tribal relationships but limited conservation experience have strong interest in collaborating with a loan program that can provide technical assistance and help them build their capacity in this arena.
Once the platform is up and running with 5-10 initial funds, we see significant opportunity to extend to meet other needs in the communities served, while also scaling up to launch funds in new geographies and programmatic areas. We believe the platform has the potential to grow to over $1 billion in catalytic capital in 5-10 years and can expand to serve the United States, Canada and Mexico.