Biodiversity Net Gain: Understanding the Most Ambitious Biodiversity Policy in the World

By Maya Patel

In the 2021 Environmental Act, the United Kingdom created a policy aimed at leaving “the natural environment in a measurably better state than beforehand” by requiring all development to demonstrate ‘no net loss’ of biodiversity and a net gain of 10% for biodiversity. This policy is one of the boldest and most ambitious biodiversity offset policies on the planet. The Environment Act created a framework of requirements for the program and subsequent regulation and policy development that will create the foundation of a regulatory biodiversity market in the UK is still in the works. In November of 2023, mandatory net gain will go into effect and this research aimed to understand how the policy will be implemented, identify the key risks to implementation, and provide recommendations for implementation and policy evolution based on lessons that can be learned from environmental markets in the US.