Restore freshwater ecosystems

Legally binding legislation, policies and regulations related to freshwater ecosystems are essential to provide clear guidance on best practices for restoration, as well as the environmental and socioeconomic boundaries within which they must operate. Codifying such laws can also signal a nation’s commitment to freshwater ecosystem restoration.

Examples of such instruments include subsidies that incentivize ecosystem restoration, policies that reduce water pollution, water tariff reforms that require utilities to allocate a share of revenues to conservation, and public-private financing mechanisms — such as payments for ecosystem services — that help mobilize funding for freshwater restoration.

For instance, the U.K.’s Environment Act 2021 strengthened regulatory authority to hold polluters accountable, with fines directed to a Water Restoration Fund supporting local water improvement projects. The Indonesian government established the Peatland Restoration Agency in 2016 with a mandate to restore 2.6 million hectares (Mha) of degraded peatlands — an effort that by 2024 had already resulted in the restoration of 1.6 Mha of peatland.

As of 2024, 54% of countries have at least one documented legal or policy instrument focused on freshwater ecosystem restoration — up from just 13% in 2000.

Restoring critical freshwater ecosystems can help revive biodiversity, support climate mitigation and deliver a wide range of societal benefits. Yet restoration finance remains far below the levels needed to achieve these goals.

Globally consistent, annually updated data that focuses on funding dedicated to restoring converted and degraded ecosystems is currently not available. Instead, the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) publishes the State of Finance for Nature, which routinely estimates public and private funds flowing to nature-based solutions more broadly. The latest installment finds that total tracked finance flowing toward these measures reached roughly $220 billion in 2023 — only a 5% increase from 2022.

These investments would need to more than double to reach the $571 billion needed per year by 2030 and more than triple to $771 billion per year by 2050 to help achieve the goals of the Paris Agreement, the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework and Land Degradation Neutrality. In the near term, investment needs are highest for restoration — particularly mangroves, salt marshes and peatlands — with $83 billion needed annually by 2030 and $61 billion by 2050 for these three ecosystems alone, compared to just $64 billion invested across all restoration efforts, as well as those focused on sustainable land management, in 2022. At the same time, nearly $7 trillion in annual financial flows continue to actively harm nature, vastly overshadowing investments in restoration and other nature-based solutions. While the UNEP report provides critical insight into the scale of change required to accelerate restoration, data on funding specifically dedicated to restoring freshwater ecosystems remains relatively scarce.

Weak institutional capacity, particularly at local levels, often impedes countries that have established supportive restoration policies on paper — such as policy, law or regulation that mandates or incentivizes freshwater restoration, or policies on community-based water tenure rights — from implementing them in practice. Ensuring that local governments are well-resourced, adequately staffed and politically empowered to implement restoration policies, as well as enforce supportive laws and regulations, can help build much-needed capacity.

Government capacity, however, can be quite difficult to quantify — for example, it encompasses mechanisms for coordinating across ministries and at different scales of government, leadership structures, processes for allocating funds to local levels, and institutional incentives needed to deliver conservation strategies. This indicator uses aggregate scores focused on regulatory enforcement from the World Justice Project Rule of Law Index as a proxy. 

As of 2025, only 31% of 143 governments around the world boasted relatively high levels of regulatory enforcement, and this share has remained relatively stable. 

Water tenure rights define how people can access, use, manage and make decisions about water resources. Secure and well-defined water rights are central to safeguarding access to water by Indigenous Peoples, Afro-descendant Peoples and local communities and enabling them to manage resources sustainably and equitably. The recognition of Indigenous water rights has also been shown to support the restoration of ecological and cultural resources by enabling a governance system that responds to these communities’ needs.

By contrast, threats to communal waters held by Indigenous Peoples, Afro-descendant Peoples and local communities can undermine water-based livelihoods and deepen water insecurity among already marginalized communities. Recognizing and establishing secure water rights for these communities is therefore critical to protecting their human and territorial rights and supporting sustainable, community-led resource management and resilient livelihoods.

Building on the Rights and Resources Initiative (RRI) land and forest tenure methodology, the RRI and the Environmental Law Institute developed a framework that defines community-based water tenure regimes as systems in which a local community has legally recognized rights to use and manage a freshwater resource and/or decide who is allowed to use it. Examples include the right to manage the rivers and lakes in their region or to set up and control small-scale irrigation systems stemming from communal freshwater sources.

In their 2020 report “Whose Water?” these partners identified 39 community-based water tenure regimes in 15 countries, providing a baseline for tracking legal recognition of community freshwater rights. The report also evaluated these regimes based on their ability to support community survival, culture, livelihoods and development — particularly for Indigenous Peoples, Afro-descendant Peoples and local communities.

While the report finds that rights to use and govern freshwater exist in 14 of the 15 countries assessed, significant legislative gaps and administrative barriers continue to limit communities’ ability to effectively manage and protect their freshwater resources. Data for more countries is also needed to more comprehensively assess global trends.