In this report series, the Municipal Natural Assets Initiative (MNAI) provides guidance to local governments seeking to protect nature’s services. It introduces approaches to identifying, valuing and accounting for municipal natural assets within existing financial and asset management programs to put natural assets on the same level as engineered assets, and ensure they are accounted for in the decision-making process.
The report Towards a Collaborative Strategy for Municipal Natural Asset Management: Private Lands highlights how local governments can include private land and private landowners in a comprehensive municipal natural asset management framework. It also provides a high-level overview of some of the main tools available to local governments for private lands that can complement the traditional asset management toolkit.
Healthy ecosystems provide vital services to society at multiple scales, ranging from local to global. Private landowners want to steward and enhance these ecosystem services, but they need the right information and support, as well the appropriate incentives.