GEORGETOWN, GUYANA — President Irfaan Ali has revealed that Guyana’s lush natural environment is worth an astonishing US$15.2 billion annually, placing the country’s biodiversity among the most valuable ecological assets in the world.
Speaking at the opening of the inaugural Global Biodiversity Alliance Summit in Georgetown, the President shared findings from a recent valuation conducted by global consultancy McKinsey & Company and environmental NGO Conservation International.
The report, according to Ali, represents a groundbreaking step in quantifying what the world usually takes for granted. “Their analysis tells us that Guyana’s ecosystems provide over US$15.2 billion every year in ecosystem services,” Ali announced.
“And a staggering 96% of that value comes from non-market services, the invisible benefits we all depend on but never directly pay for.” Ali highlighted that genetic resources alone, including medicinal plant compounds and unique species traits, carry an estimated annual value of US$8.4 billion.
Meanwhile, the existence and bequest value, the amount people are willing to pay just to keep nature intact for future generations, totals an additional US$3.6 billion per year.
“This is not abstract theory,” Ali said. “This is real value, real benefit, and it shows our standing forest provides more to the economy alive than if it were destroyed.”
Yet despite this immense worth, Ali warned that biodiversity remains woefully underfunded worldwide. Global investments in nature currently stand at just US$200 billion a year, far short of the US$700 billion needed to meet the Global Biodiversity Framework targets.
“To put it bluntly, we’re not putting our money where our future is,” Ali told international delegates. “That has to change. And it has to change now. ”He announced that the Global Biodiversity Alliance, a new international platform co-launched by Guyana, will focus on unlocking finance for nature by scaling blended finance models, supporting biodiversity credit markets, and expanding debt-for-nature swaps, the same model Guyana successfully implemented.
“Financing nature is not charity,” the President said firmly. “It is insurance. It is resilience. And it is a return on investment.” President Ali’s pitch comes as Guyana positions itself to lead on biodiversity and climate financing ahead of the COP30 summit in Brazil next year.
The outcomes of this week’s Georgetown summit will be formally presented at the UN climate talks in Belém, where Guyana has already secured a place at the global roundtable.
