---
title: "already run a nature market? add ensurance beside it"
canonical_url: https://ensurance.app/guide/already-run-a-nature-market-add-ensurance-beside-it
markdown_url: https://ensurance.app/guide/already-run-a-nature-market-add-ensurance-beside-it.md
subtitle: keep the operator and the platform. the place can still have an account of its own
category: nature-finance
---

# already run a nature market? add ensurance beside it

*keep the operator and the platform. the place can still have an account of its own*

If your region already runs a nature market, you have done the hard part. Projects are screened, often against your Local Nature Recovery Strategy, and an operator or platform is in place. This post is for the council or combined-authority nature lead, the operator, and the projects and buyers on either side, with one question: can ensurance sit beside a market that already works, without replacing any of it?

Yes. Start with what both are for. The river, the heath, the ponds, the hedgerows and the street trees do work for a city region whether or not any marketplace lists them. A nature market is how the businesses that depend on that work find it and pay for it. Ensurance is plumbing that can sit beside the market you run. Neither the market nor the plumbing is the worth of the heath.

The regions that went first deserve the credit. The West Midlands Combined Authority launched its Nature Investment Hub in July 2026, matching businesses with local delivery partners on tree planting, river and pond work, heathland and species projects. The North East Combined Authority launched its Carbon and Nature Marketplace in June 2025. Cornwall Council's LINC nature market was announced in March 2025 with EnTrade as operator and Arup on design, local reports say. The North Devon Biosphere says its Natural Capital Marketplace launched in 2022. Public reports link several of them to the Environment Agency's LINC programme and Defra. None of them is a client of ours.

:::johnson
**keep the market you run. the heath can still have an account of its own.** Your operator, your pipeline and your buyers stay yours. An account beside them holds funding for the place itself.

[talk to us about a market you already run →](/contact?from=guide&topic=launch-your-own-nature-market)
:::

## what you keep

The longer case for using ensurance beside work you already do is [its own page](/guide/use-ensurance-beside-the-work-you-already-do?from=guide), and the manual has [the short definition](/manual/insurance-to-ensurance?from=guide). This is the version for a region with a market in place.

| what your market does now | who keeps it | what an account beside it adds |
|---|---|---|
| Screens projects against the nature recovery strategy | The region and its partners | Nothing. The pipeline is yours |
| Runs the platform and the buyer journey | Your operator or your team | Nothing. Keep the contract |
| Sells what it was built to sell: project funding or carbon credits | The operator and the project | A certificate that records who funded which place. It is not a second unit |
| Funds projects, each with a scope and a delivery partner | The delivery partner | An account in the place's name that a buyer can also choose to fund |
| Reports to buyers in your region | The region | A public ledger line per payment that anyone can read |

Nobody has to move a project, re-list it, or change who sells it.

## what an account beside it adds

The manual calls this supplemental, and it is narrow: fund the living condition the existing work does not itself sell, and leave the program with the people running it. In a region with a market, that comes to three things.

**An account for the place.** A project is a piece of work: planting, a pond dug, a stretch of river reconnected. The heath, pond or riverbank it sits on has a condition that goes on after the work is signed off. On ensurance, that place can have its own **agent**, an account that holds value in its name inside your region's **group** (a namespace such as `.mumbai`, `.boulder` or `.tokyo`, all live). A buyer who wants to name a pond, a heath or a stretch of river can fund it there too, alongside whatever already pays for the work.

**A way for buyers outside your platform to find a place.** Your region's group sits in the same protocol as every other group, place and cause on ensurance. Its coins can be swapped through `$ENSURE`, the protocol's working coin, the same way as every other group's coins; any account can hold its certificates, and cross-city groups such as [urban nature](/urban-nature.syndicate?from=guide) and [the water cycle](/water-cycle.syndicate?from=guide) already gather a theme across places. Once your places are listed, a company with sites in three regions can find them on [the markets page](/markets?from=guide). The links are live; the depth between markets is still early, and nothing here promises that a buyer from outside your region will come.

**A public record per project.** Accounts, certificates and payments on ensurance are recorded on Base, a public ledger. Anyone can check that a payment reached a named place.

## one record per project, so nothing counts twice

This rule makes "beside" honest. If a business has already funded a project through your market, it does not buy a certificate for the same work as a second claim. If a project holds carbon credits under a code, or is registered as a biodiversity gain site, a certificate on ensurance does not stand in for either.

Agree it per project with your operator and say which record holds the claim:

- **Work your market already sells:** your market's record holds the claim. The account beside it is for the place's condition after the work, not the work again.
- **A place your market does not list:** the certificate is the record, and the account receives.
- **Both, deliberately:** two buyers, two distinct pieces of work, written down as distinct, each with one record.

A certificate here is a record that a named buyer funded named work at a named place. It is not a carbon credit, a biodiversity net gain unit, an offset or an investment. A business cannot use it to meet a statutory BNG duty or to claim offsetting; [demand by statute](/guide/demand-by-statute?from=guide) is the page on what does.

## local nature recovery strategy funding from more than one door

England's 48 Local Nature Recovery Strategy areas now cover the whole country, each with a responsible authority. The West Midlands hub reportedly asks that projects align with its regional strategy, which WMCA estimates needs about £150m, public and private.

Ensurance does not write a second measure. Your strategy names the priority habitats and the places; an account beside your market uses that same list. If the strategy names the river corridor or the heath, that is the place the account is named for. The science stays with your ecologists, the screening with whoever screens now, and the funding gains another door.

## who does what

**The region** keeps the strategy, the pipeline, the operator and the trust of local buyers. It decides which places get an account beside the market, and it agrees the one-record rule with its operator.

**The project** keeps its delivery contract and its listing. It can hold an account for the place it works on, with a certificate line created after review, without building a payments setup.

**The business** keeps buying through your market. To fund the heath after the project closes, or places in more than one region through the same kind of account, it can use ensurance and have a line it can report. What a framework accepts is the framework's rule.

## what is not live

Said exactly. A front end in your region's own brand or domain is built to order and scoped at contact; we have not delivered one for any region yet. Today the front end is a group page on ensurance.app, such as [/groups/mumbai](/groups/mumbai?from=guide), with a page for each agent. A fiat or invoice checkout for a council or business buyer is not live; how a buyer pays is scoped at contact. Projects cannot list themselves without review. Certificates are suggested and created after review; the instant option on the site says coming soon. Ensurance does not issue BNG units, Woodland Carbon Code or Peatland Code credits, or any regulated unit, and it is not a register entry. It is a public ledger and a service, not investment, tax, legal or accounting advice, and the council stays the accountable body for its own procurement and its own claims.

## frequently asked questions

### we already have a market operator. do we have to change it?

No. Keep the operator, the platform and the contract. An account on ensurance sits beside them, and you agree one record per project so nothing is counted twice.

### how does this help local nature recovery strategy funding?

It adds a door to the same list. The strategy names the places; an account beside your market lets a buyer fund one by name, including after delivery is done, with a public record of the payment.

### could the same work be counted twice?

Only if nobody writes down which record holds the claim. Agree it per project: work your market sells stays on your market's record, and a certificate here covers a place or a piece of work your market does not sell.

### what does it cost?

Applying for a group costs nothing and is reviewed. If you want it done for you, the public rate card lists a deployment at $15,000–$50,000 and a program at $1,000–$4,000 a month, by the size of the town or region, on [our services page](/services?from=guide#finance).

## next step

Regional partnerships can start from [the regional collaboratives page](/solutions/regional-collaboratives?from=guide&topic=launch-your-own-nature-market), councils and combined authorities from [the governments page](/solutions/governments?from=guide&topic=launch-your-own-nature-market), and a business that already buys through a regional market from [the corporations page](/solutions/corporations?from=guide&topic=launch-your-own-nature-market). Or [tell us the region, the operator, and the first place you want an account for](/contact?from=guide&topic=launch-your-own-nature-market).

## sources

- [WMCA, West Midlands Nature Investment Hub](https://www.wmca.org.uk/what-we-do/environment-energy/natural-environment/west-midlands-nature-investment-hub/): the July 2026 launch and the kinds of project in the pipeline
- [WMCA on the £150m plan](https://wmca.org.uk/news/mayor-calls-on-businesses-to-back-150million-nature-recovery-plan/): the strategy estimate
- [West Midlands Nature Hub](https://naturehub.wmca.org.uk/): project alignment with the regional strategy
- [North East Combined Authority, marketplace launch](https://northeast-ca.gov.uk/news/environment-coastal-and-rural/north-east-mayor-launches-uk-s-first-combined-authority-led-carbon-and-nature-marketplace): the June 2025 launch
- [Business Cornwall](https://businesscornwall.co.uk/latest-news/2025/03/new-nature-market-to-support-cornwalls-environment/): Cornwall's LINC nature market, EnTrade and Arup
- [North Devon Biosphere, Natural Capital Marketplace launch](https://northdevonbiosphere.org.uk/news/the-natural-capital-marketplace-launches-with-a-large-carbon-offset-order-from-devon-county-council): the 2022 launch
- [GOV.UK, green finance boost for nature](https://www.gov.uk/government/news/green-finance-boost-for-nature-in-uk): the LINC programme
- [GOV.UK, Local Nature Recovery Strategies](https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/local-nature-recovery-strategies): the 48 strategy areas
- [GOV.UK, understanding biodiversity net gain](https://www.gov.uk/guidance/understanding-biodiversity-net-gain): the statutory duty a certificate does not meet
- [Use ensurance beside the work you already do](/guide/use-ensurance-beside-the-work-you-already-do?from=guide): the wider case
- [Our services page](/services?from=guide#finance): the public rate card

## the series

1. [how to launch a nature market for your city or region](/guide/how-to-launch-a-nature-market-for-your-city?from=guide)
2. [what is inside a nature marketplace](/guide/what-is-inside-a-nature-marketplace?from=guide)
3. [what a local carbon market is, and what it leaves out](/guide/what-a-local-carbon-market-leaves-out?from=guide)
4. [why a business funds nature in its own region](/guide/why-a-business-funds-nature-in-its-own-region?from=guide)
5. [you do not have to build the marketplace](/guide/you-do-not-have-to-build-the-marketplace?from=guide)
6. [launch your region's nature market on ensurance](/guide/launch-your-regions-nature-market-on-ensurance?from=guide)
7. **already run a nature market? add ensurance beside it** (you are here)