For too long, companies have been trapped in the rigid, reductionist mindset of net-zero and carbon neutrality. The dominant narrative demands that businesses neutralize their carbon footprint by reducing and offsetting CO2 emissions. But baked into this approach are a series of flawed assumptions and misaligned incentives that undermine progress and, in many cases, create unintended harm.

At Native, we believe it’s time for a radical shift—from a compensation mindset to a contribution mindset. A compensation mindset aims to compensate for emissions by offsetting in order to make a carbon neutral claim. Contribution mindset on the other hand focuses on meaningful climate impact beyond the value chain, without associating this with any carbon neutral claim.

Contribution mindset allows businesses to move beyond misleading net zero claims, prioritise meaningful impact over measurable outcomes, and embrace a holistic, nature-first approach to planetary health.

The problems with “compensation mindset”

1. Carbon reductionism

At their core, carbon markets assume that all climate impacts can be reduced to a single metric: CO2. This is a dangerous oversimplification. Nature’s health is about more than just carbon—it’s about water cycles, biodiversity, soil health, habitat integrity, and indigenous land rights. Prioritizing carbon above all else leads to misaligned incentives and problematic side effects. For example, we’ve already seen cases where indigenous communities were forcibly removed from their lands in order to optimize carbon sequestration. This is the direct result of a framework that values single metrics over whole ecosystems and which tries to squeeze the complexity and majesty of nature into a carbon straightjacket.

2. A bureaucratic black hole

The obsession with precise carbon quantification has created an industry bogged down in waste and bureaucracy, ultimately benefiting consultants and auditors more than the planet itself. The global market for Environmental Consulting Services is projected to be worth $43.2bn by 2026, - roughly 20x the size of the entire voluntary carbon market in 2024. Many of these resources spent on the ever-more-precise measurement, verification, and certification of carbon could be channeled into direct, meaningful impact. 

3. Nature-based solutions get sidelined

Compensation mindset requires carefully calculated additionality—the idea that a climate intervention or an emissions reduction wouldn’t have happened without carbon financing. But when it comes to protecting existing intact nature this involves calculating “what ifs” e.g. what would have happened to this forest if we had not intervened, which is inherently uncertain. As a result, our most pristine and precious ecosystems are grossly undervalued. Meanwhile, technology-based carbon reduction solutions—which are far less impactful—get prioritized because they fit neatly into carbon accounting models.

4. The race to the bottom: flawed offsets and additionality concerns

Ambitious net zero claims from heavy polluting industries such as aviation or fossil fuels put enormous pressure on companies to find the cheapest offsets and incentivize buyers (and by extension accreditors, verifiers etc. to cut corners). This fuels a system where projects exaggerate threats to nature in order to demonstrate additionality. This distorts the market and penalizes high-quality projects that take a more conservative approach to estimating their impact, while rewarding those who game the system.

The “contribution mindset”: a better way forward

1. Prioritizing impact over measurement

Companies should stop wasting resources on excessive verification and instead channel funding directly into high-impact projects. Less bureaucracy, more real-world impact.

2. Better marketing, better stakeholder engagement

Nature protection doesn’t have to be a market - it’s marketing. It’s hardly surprising that carbon neutrality claims no longer resonate with consumers - it’s quite hard to think of something less inspiring than a tonne of odourless gas. Nature, on the other hand, moves people. Brands that integrate nature protection into their business and focus their resources on creative storytelling and communication—like some Native clients who protect a Square of rainforest for every new customer—build trust, engage stakeholders, and drive real climate action.

3. Expanding the scope of climate action

Contribution mindset allows companies to invest in high-value conservation projects that carbon markets ignore. High-impact, non-carbon centric projects such as coral reef restoration, or hybrid restoration techniques such as Assisted Natural Regeneration now become viable paths forward—no longer dismissed just because they don’t fit neatly into a carbon ledger, or because additionality is hard to nail down.

Native: protect our planet, one square at a time

At Native, we are building a new model of nature markets—one that moves beyond the flawed, outdated, one-dimensional carbon market and embraces a multi-metric approach that values carbon, biodiversity, and community impact, all measured and tracked on your impact dashboard.

Why choose native?

• Holistic nature-based solutions: Protects biodiversity and supports indigenous communities—not just carbon

• Full transparency: See every single Square you have protected on our map, allowing you not just to monitor your impact but showcase it as well

• Authentic sustainability storytelling: Engage employees, attract climate-conscious customers, and appeal to green investors with impactful nature-driven initiatives which actually speak to people

If your company wants to engage employees, attract climate-conscious customers, and appeal to green investors—while making a real difference—join us. Protect a square of rainforest. Support frontline indigenous guardians. Make a contribution that actually matters.

The future of business is nature-positive. Let’s build it together.

This article is also published on Native. illuminem Voices is a democratic space presenting the thoughts and opinions of leading Sustainability & Energy writers, their opinions do not necessarily represent those of illuminem.