Cross-Sectoral Benefits of the EU Nature Restoration Regulation

The EU Nature Restoration Regulation (NRR), which entered into force in August 2024, is the first comprehensive law at a continental scale aimed at restoring Europe's degraded ecosystems. It is a cornerstone of the EU Biodiversity Strategy to 2030, which mandates binding targets to restore ecosystems that are essential for biodiversity, climate resilience, and disaster prevention.

This report examines how restoration can serve as a unifying solution addressing biodiversity loss, climate change, water scarcity, and land degradation simultaneously, rather than treating these as separate policy challenges. The NRR marks a paradigm shift in how Europe approaches its interconnected environmental threats. Rather than treating biodiversity loss, climate change, water scarcity, and land degradation as separate policy challenges, the NRR recognises that restoring ecosystems can deliver across multiple sectors simultaneously. 

With Member States currently drawing up their National Restoration Plans (NRPs) for the September 2026 deadline, this report focuses on implementation at the national, regional and local level. It examines how restoration can be managed as a catalyst for cross-sectoral collaboration and practical solutions. The analysis takes a solutions-oriented approach by identifying enabling conditions, cross sectoral synergies, and practical insights gathered from good practices and lessons learned from eight Member State case studies (Croatia, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Poland, Spain, Sweden). Through 27 interviews with 32 experts (government representatives, environmental NGOs, researchers, sector representatives) and extensive desk research, this evidence-based analysis highlights what can work well, and why, so lessons can be shared across contexts. Throughout, we focus on enablers, synergies, and practical insights, the conditions that allow restoration to succeed.