CI-BHP Billiton Alliance for Protected Area Conservation

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by Mahlette Betre, Conservation International.

CI-BHP Billiton Alliance

Conservation International

The Conservation International (CI) - BHP Billiton Alliance supports the delivery of enduring benefits to biodiversity, ecosystems and other environmental resources around the world. This strategic long-term alliance was formed in 2011 to support the delivery of their conservation target, and to improve BHP Billiton’s approach to biodiversity management more broadly. To date, two conservation projects are underway in Australia and Chile.

Last update: 02 Oct 2020

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Context

Challenges addressed

Loss of Biodiversity

Ecosystem loss

Lack of access to long-term funding

Lack of technical capacity

support delivery of enduring benefits to biodiversity, ecosystems /environmental resources

Scale of implementation

Global

Ecosystems

Temperate deciduous forest

River, stream

Wetland (swamp, marsh, peatland)

Theme

Species management

Mitigation

Ecosystem services

Sustainable livelihoods

Local actors

Location

Australia and Chile

South America

Process

Building Blocks

Design and implementation of conservation project portfolio

Through the Alliance, CI and BHP Billiton have jointly developed a systematic framework and approach to designing and implementing conservation investments. The approach leverages both BHP Billiton’s risk based approach to project design and CI’s experience and expertise in establishing long-term conservation areas that address financial, legal and governance requirements. Projects are selected based on their conservation significance and evaluated to ensure that they will make a lasting contribution to our global natural heritage. Each project is required to reach a high standard for effective conservation management and will be supported by a sustainable financing mechanism, so benefits to people and nature will continue for many years into the future.

Enabling factors

The approach leverages both BHP Billiton’s risk based approach to project design and CI’s experience and expertise in establishing long-term conservation areas that address financial, legal and governance requirements.

Lesson learned

Prior to launching the collaboration, both organizations spent a year collaborating, building trust, understanding respective expertise, tools, management systems and jointly piloting and developing processes that formed the basis for the Alliance. One of the applied learning’s of the Alliance to date has been application of new risk assessment methodologies to conservation projects, using insights from BHP Billiton’s robust systems for risk identification, assessment, prevention and control. These methodologies, when applied to conservation project design, allow for improved communication of project planning and implementation to decision makers whose core area of business expertise fall outside environmental conservation. Importantly, they have also resulted in project investments that should be resilient to a variety of factors and events – including reputational, financial and implementation risks.

Inform corporate requirements

CI has been providing technical expertise to BHP Billiton to help them manage land and enhance biodiversity in a responsible manner. This has included contributing to improvements in their corporate environmental requirements in the areas of compensatory actions and the definition of ‘area of influence’, which takes into account business activities and their potential direct, indirect and cumulative impacts on the environment.

Enabling factors

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Lesson learned

BHP Billiton has applied lessons learnt through the governance and financing requirements for protected areas to establish more robust internal requirements for compensatory actions (or offsets).

Impacts

The Alliance has been influential in enhancing BHP Billiton’s approach to biodiversity. As part of a recent review of environmental management requirements, BHP Billiton has established principles to guide its businesses on establishing compensatory actions. The principles require that compensatory actions must be appropriate and not contribute to any additional impacts, must be effective in responding to the residual impact and must endure in the long term. As of 2014, BHP Billiton has voluntarily committed more than US$30 million to conservation, including the Five Rivers Conservation Area in Tasmania, Australia, and the Valdivian Coastal Reserve Project in southern Chile. Results: • Conservation of ~ 60,000 ha of habitat for 16 globally threatened species • Support of more than 50 direct jobs • Generation of ~ 900 million cubic metres of high-quality fresh water • Avoidance of the release of 75,000 tonnes of CO2 -e per annum