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The China Nature Markets initiative is an 18-month project bringing together the Institute of Finance and Sustainability (IFS), Morphosis, and The Landbanking Group (TLG) in association with the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). The initiative tests whether nature markets can be designed, piloted, and scaled in China in ways that integrate ecological assets into financial systems.

Focusing on the biodiversity-rich region of Ya’an (Sichuan), the project moves from concept to practice, developing high-integrity models using both stand-alone biodiversity credits aligned with the International Advisory Panel on Biodiversity Credits (IAPB) and integrated nature credits that capture broader ecosystem services including water regulation and soil health. Underpinned by AI-driven monitoring and a shared evidence infrastructure for ecological assessment, verification, and registry, the initiative aims to produce a credible, scalable, and internationally relevant blueprint for nature markets, positioning China at the forefront of mobilising investment into resilience for the natural world.

This technical paper is part of a series of publications emerging from the China Nature Markets Initiative. It traces the ecological evidence base that any future nature market would need, from ground to claim. Drawing on fieldwork across pilot landscapes, it examines why some of China’s most intensively monitored ecosystems still cannot yet support a market transaction. China already holds a much stronger evidence base, in monitoring, ecosystem accounting, and rights registration, than the market infrastructure built to use it. This paper poses a precise question to that evidence base: what would it take to connect what is already measured to a claim that a market, or a lender, could actually rely on? We welcome views from practitioners, policymakers, and standard-setters as the work proceeds.

This technical paper can be read in conjunction with the accompanying policy paper: China’s Institutional Foundations for Nature Markets.