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The report finds that granting legal personhood to rivers is a symbolic starting point that often fails to produce material ecological recovery due to fragmented governance, anthropocentric interpretations, and the marginalization of local knowledge. In Bangladesh, a state-led guardianship model lacks enforcement power and community representation, while Colombia's shared guardianship model incorporates biocultural knowledge but remains constrained by financial limitations and sectoral fragmentation.

The report highlights a growing 'e-mobility divide' where the Global North adopts high-value lithium-ion systems while the Global South relies on affordable but toxic lead-acid batteries. It identifies critical failures in traceability and international governance, specifically within the Basel Convention, which allow for 'waste colonialism' and hazardous informal recycling. The authors argue for mandatory extended producer responsibility, the creation of regional recycling hubs, and the integration of informal workers into formal systems to ensure a just energy transition.

The report finds that while the 2022 consultation law has enabled some marginal influence, it often fails to provide meaningful impact on central issues. Major deficiencies include late involvement of Sámi representatives, inadequate timeframes, and a tendency for authorities to delegate responsibility to third-party applicants. The study highlights a significant 'educational burden' placed on Sámi parties to explain the law to officials and notes that many critical land-use matters remain exempt from the law's scope.

The document argues that commercial insect farming in high-income northern hemisphere countries often fails to deliver its theoretical environmental benefits. It notes that greenhouse gas emissions from insect protein can approach those of chicken and pork, and that the industry often supports conventional animal agriculture by providing feed rather than replacing meat in human diets. Additionally, the report highlights risks to biodiversity, animal welfare concerns, and the opportunity cost of diverting investment from other alternative proteins like plant-based or cultivated options.

The report identifies North American carbon credit markets as fragmented, confusing, and unreliable, overseen by a mix of state regulatory bodies and non-profit programs. It advocates for increased integration and the establishment of government-administered voluntary programs, buyer coalitions, and recognition for responsible credit use to attract private investment and align current markets with future policies.

The document introduces a social impact framework developed by the NBSPLUS project to improve the intentional design and assessment of nature-based solutions (NbS). It defines NbS as the use of natural processes and blue-green infrastructure—including parks, wetlands, green roofs, and restored waterways—to tackle climate, biodiversity, and societal challenges. The framework categorizes social impacts into several dimensions, including physical and mental health, recreational value, place attachment, knowledge and learning, pro-environmental behavior, social cohesion, justice (recognitional, distributive, and procedural), economic value, food security, and empowerment.

The document argues that policy incoherence is driven not by poor coordination, but by power asymmetries, vested interests, and the prioritization of economic growth over social and environmental goals. Based on research in nine countries, it finds that fossil-fuel interests consistently drive incoherence and that vulnerable groups disproportionately bear the resulting burdens. It calls for a post-2030 framework that moves beyond 'synergies' to address distributional consequences and cross-border spillovers.

The research finds that conservation policies in the Brazilian Amazon that successfully reduced deforestation generally failed to reduce forest degradation, which continues to impact carbon stocks, biodiversity, and ecosystem services.

The Wood Solution Thailand Program's engagement phase (March–June 2026) seeks to transition Thailand's building sector from concrete to sustainable timber to reduce emissions and support rural development. The initiative, a partnership between the Stockholm Environment Institute, the Eco-Innovation Foundation, and the Thailand and Nordic countries Innovation Unit, focuses on five workstreams: conducting a value chain feasibility study, supporting pioneer pilot initiatives, creating a support platform for international experts, hosting a vision event in Bangkok, and developing funding partnerships. The program intends to link cities to local forests, utilizing plantations, agroforestry, and managed secondary forests to create permanent carbon sinks and improve rural livelihoods.

The Stockholm Environment Institute's systemic climate adaptation framework provides a normative guide to make adaptation policy more coherent, equitable, and robust. It is built on three core pillars: systemic risk framing, policy interlinkages, and deep uncertainty management. These pillars translate into six guiding principles—interconnected by design, shared risk ownership, co-benefits and everyday value, no-regrets and anti-maladaptation, equity and just resilience, and adaptive governance under deep uncertainty. The framework is intended as 'adaptable scaffolding' for stress-testing decisions, such as national strategies or investment pipelines, rather than a rigid checklist.

The report identifies a recurring 'implementation gap' where adaptation policies increasingly use the language of systemic risk—interconnected hazards, cascading impacts, and deep uncertainty—but continue to operate through hazard- and sector-based routines. Through comparative analysis of the EU, ASEAN, and the US, it finds that mandates, funding, and monitoring systems remain fragmented, often ignoring policy trade-offs and distributional inequities. It concludes by proposing a framework based on systemic risk framing, policy interlinkages, and deep uncertainty management to help decision-makers stress-test investments and avoid maladaptation.

The Wood Solution Thailand project is a strategic collaboration between the Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI), Eco-Innovation Foundation (EIF), and the Thailand and Nordic countries Innovation Unit (TNIU). The project's initial engagement phase focuses on developing a sustainable wood construction value chain—from managed forests and agroforestry to high-quality building materials—to transition urban construction from concrete to wood, thereby creating permanent carbon sinks and enhancing rural employment.

The briefing details consumption-based emissions for Swedish households in 2023, highlighting that while total emissions per person are similar across different municipality groups, the composition of these emissions varies by geography and income. It introduces the Consumption Compass 2.0 as a tool for local governments to identify emission hotspots and implement precise, inclusive climate policies.

The report argues that commercial insect farming in high-income, temperate regions often fails to meet its theoretical sustainability promises. While insects have lower greenhouse gas emissions than beef, they often perform worse than the soymeal and fishmeal they are intended to replace. The authors identify seven key challenges: outdated life cycle assessments, under-utilization of organic waste as feed, limited substitution of meat in human diets, the reinforcement of industrial animal agriculture through use as feed, biodiversity risks from unintentional releases, emerging animal welfare concerns, and the opportunity cost of diverting investment from more promising plant-based or cultivated proteins.

The briefing argues that while climate and sustainable development goals are theoretically synergistic, actual policy coherence is hindered by political inequality, vested interests, and the prioritization of economic growth. Through analysis of nine countries and global NDC data, the research demonstrates that coherence is not a neutral technocratic exercise but a political process with significant distributional consequences, often burdening vulnerable groups when political will for equity is absent.

The paper introduces the Preferable Futures (PF) Deck, a wellbeing intervention and toolkit developed through a 'research-through-design' process. Positioned at the intersection of participatory design, futures thinking, and ecological citizenship, the deck aims to inspire place-based action for an ecologically ethical transition by recognizing the link between human and planetary health. The authors propose a 'post-participatory intervention' model where designers act as catalysts for community-led practices rather than mere facilitators of predefined projects. The toolkit is intended for use by community organizers, educators, and policy-adjacent actors to facilitate democratic and ecological transformation.

The report evaluates the potential of the EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) to mitigate the environmental impact of seven forest-risk commodities. It concludes that while the EUDR can deliver substantial reductions, its effectiveness is maximized when integrated with broader policy measures targeting consumption, production, and trade incentives.

The report examines the decarbonization of the commercial vehicle sector, which contributes 37% of road-transport CO2 emissions. It highlights that technology pathways are shaped by national priorities and geopolitical interests, notes the uncertain cost-competitiveness of long-haul low-carbon trucks, and discusses the tension between OEM diversification and the need for economies of scale.

The document advocates for ending the artificial separation of climate mitigation and adaptation, arguing that treating them as parallel streams wastes resources and undermines sustainable development. It emphasizes that climate change is a systemic condition of development rather than a standalone sector. Using examples from Asia's energy, food, and water systems, the text demonstrates how integrated planning—such as combining low-carbon buildings with heat resilience—creates essential synergies. The author calls for structural shifts in governance, including the institutionalization of climate risk assessments for all infrastructure and a move by international donors from funding discrete projects to supporting holistic development programs.

The document outlines the ecological, hydrological, and cultural significance of the Andes, which spans over 8,500 kilometers across seven South American countries and supports more than 68 million people. It synthesizes biophysical, socioeconomic, and climate data from the Andean Mountain Initiative (IAM), the Consortium for Sustainable Development of the Andean Ecoregion (CONDESAN), and regional partners to establish a basis for sustainability and climate action.