Anne-Marie Bor Shifts Focus to Solely Serve on FfB Foundation Board
19 December 2023 – In January 2024, Anne-Marie Bor, co-founding Development Director, will shift her focus to a pivotal role as a board member of the Finance for Biodiversity (FfB) Foundation. Alongside co-founding Executive Director Anita de Horde, she has played a key role in setting up the Finance for Biodiversity (FfB) Pledge in 2020 and forming the FfB Foundation in 2021. Anne-Marie is already a board member together with Anita de Horde and their collaborative efforts so far have also included coordinating the activities of the FfB Foundation. This transition will allow Anne-Marie to dedicate more time again to leading NextGreen, the company she founded in 2011.
“We would like to express our gratitude to Anne-Marie Bor for her remarkable efforts in collaboratively setting up the FfB Foundation. Anne-Marie’s unwavering dedication as co-founder has been instrumental. As she transitions to concentrate on her role as a board member, we express our heartfelt appreciation for her entrepreneurial spirit, passion, and collaborative energy. Anticipating the continuation of our shared commitment to sustainability, finance and biodiversity as board members, I look forward to our future adventures together”, said co-founding Executive Director Anita de Horde.
Read the full interview with Anne-Marie Bor below.
Why focus on board membership only?
“After almost three years of setting up and building the FfB Foundation together with Anita de Horde, it is time for a new focus. While coordinating several activities of the FfB Foundation, other projects under NextGreen continued successfully as well. I was only able to work about two days per week for the FfB Foundation. It was very fun and meaningful to co-initiate this promising movement. It once started with the EU Finance & Biodiversity project, which NextGreen has been working on since 2017 for the European Commission. When F&B Community members wanted to organise an expedition on biodiversity in the run-up to COP15, Anne-Marie started to involve Anita de Horde to advise the F&B Community. The whole journey started from there, with setting up a biodiversity pledge. It has been an exciting and meaningful rollercoaster, with high-impact activities. It was great fun to pioneer in the early days with Anita and see the FfB Foundation evolving and maturing. We have now built a solid house with a brilliant team that does a great job for the members and the movement as a whole. As a board member, I will still be involved, but more strategically and a bit more at a distance.”
Photo: FfB Foundation Board member Anne-Marie Bor in the FfB Foundation booth at COP15 in Montreal, December 2022
Will you miss the FfB Foundation?
“I will certainly miss the people, the team, the co-chairs, the members and our partners. Interacting with them on a day-to-day basis has been absolutely wonderful. We have done so much in not even three years, from building a movement with now 163 signatories and 76 members, to setting up member-led and highly productive working groups. Moreover, we brought ambitious vibes to COP15 in Montreal, created a finance sector-home at our booth, and initiated and collaborated on Nature Action 100. I am very proud of ‘our child’ the FfB Foundation; letting go has a bittersweet feeling as well. The FfB Foundation is growing and maturing, which requires a different kind of leadership and finance sector expertise than in the early days of groundbreaking work. I am confident that under the visionary and courageous leadership of Anita, the foundation will continue to function as a solid house where both team and members find a home to thrive. I am looking forward to hearing more exciting news on the achievements of members and the working groups. And as a board member, I will still be able to meet the members and the team.
Photo: Anne-Marie Bor during a FfB Foundation dinner event in Milan, October 2023
There will also still be lots of opportunities for collaboration! With the continuation of my work for the European Commission Finance & Biodiversity Community for at least 2024 and 2025, we will jointly work on publications and the ‘We need to talk about biodiversity’ webinar series. It’s a pleasure that I will still be in touch with team members and FfB Foundation members, this time with a focus on dialogues with European Commission policymakers.”
What will you be working on with NextGreen?
NextGreen is a co-creation facilitation company for sustainability that I set up in 2011. My passion is the facilitation of group processes for sustainable transitions. Facilitating dialogues and leading Communities of Practices, multi-stakeholder coalitions and networks is what I love to do most. Since I have been leading the Dutch initiative ‘Green Deal on Green Roofs’, the search for multiple-benefit business cases has caught my attention. In the Netherlands, I have initiated a finance sector group that is collaborating on climate adaptation. Banks, insurers and (real estate)investors have analysed the impact of climate change, climate adaptation and public-private solutions at the sector level. The group focused on the built environment, agriculture, industry and transport. They captured their results in a report that they will present to the Dutch Minister of Infrastructure and Water Management on 21 December. In 2024, this group will be working on pilots with governments and local authorities, building on their recommendations for developing labels, nudging and incentives, stacking finance flows and conditions. I believe there are a lot of similarities between climate adaptation and biodiversity. The FfB guide ‘Unlocking the biodiversity-climate nexus‘ has already addressed this. We will certainly hear from one another and build on further synergies together to turn the tide of biodiversity loss and co-create resilient eco- and social systems. Being connected as a board member will help bring the best of both worlds together.”