Valerie Hickey, Global Director for Environment at the World Bank Group, will address delegates at the second Global Biodiversity Alliance (GBA) Conference in Georgetown, Guyana. She will argue that biological diversity should be treated as a formal economic asset and written into national fiscal policy, budget allocations and sovereign development plans, rather than handled only as a conservation obligation.

Dr Hickey will take part in a session titled "Biodiversity as an Economic Asset: Policy, Fiscal and Institutional Leadership". It will be chaired by Dr Ashni Singh, Guyana's Senior Minister in the Office of the President with responsibility for Finance. The agenda looks beyond standalone, project-level conservation deals. Instead, it considers reforms to macroeconomic frameworks, clearer institutional responsibilities and public investment systems that account for the value of nature. A project funded in isolation can deliver results locally, but it does little to change how a government plans its spending or assesses risk.

The panel will also ask what regulatory, fiscal and policy signals would reduce the risk for green capital. Commercial lenders and multilateral institutions tend to commit money when rules are stable and returns can be estimated. Where those conditions are missing, nature projects often fail to attract funds, however sound their ecological case. The session will try to define what governments must supply to change that.

The panel brings together lenders, a ratings analyst and regional development finance. Mauricio Velasquez will speak for CAF, the Development Bank of Latin America and the Caribbean. Shawn Gurcharran, Chief Executive Officer of the Guyana Bank for Trade and Industry, will give the view of a domestic commercial lender. Carlos Cordova of S&P Global will bring the perspective of a credit rating agency, whose assessments influence how sovereign borrowers are priced. Oliver Withers, Head of Nature Finance at Standard Chartered, will represent an international private bank.

Dr Hickey will also take part in a ministerial plenary on the overall state of international nature finance. It will be presided over by Guyana's Vice President, Dr Bharrat Jagdeo. The plenary is expected to review how much money is moving towards biodiversity worldwide and where the shortfalls lie.

Dr Hickey leads the World Bank Group's global strategy on nature, natural resource management, circular economy models and pollution abatement. She previously served as the Bank's Global Director for Climate Change. Over a decade she managed environmental portfolios across Latin America, Europe, Central Asia and East Asia. Her technical work has covered the blue economy, efforts to counter wildlife trafficking and the environmental problems of fragile states. She holds a doctorate from Duke University.

The conference will be held on 30 and 31 October at the Arthur Chung Conference Centre. Its theme is "Investing in Nature: Accelerating Biodiversity Finance for Sustainable Development". The meeting continues work begun at the alliance's inaugural conference, also held in Georgetown, in July 2025.

The presence of a ratings agency and a commercial bank alongside development lenders reflects the practical question before the session. Governments can announce biodiversity targets, but investors will respond to budget treatments, institutional accountability and clear rules. If the panel produces concrete proposals on those points, they would give finance ministries something to adopt, which is a narrower outcome than a general statement of intent but a more useful one.

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