McKenna Davis is a Senior Fellow at Ecologic Institute, where she leads the Nature-based Solutions (NbS) team. With over 15 years of experience at the science–policy–society interface, she works to mainstream inclusive NbS, strengthen biodiversity governance, and support climate adaptation. By connecting research, policy and practice, she brings together diverse actors to advance a transition towards a climate-resilient and nature-positive economy. She is a native English speaker and fluent in German.

Her research explores how NbS and ecosystem restoration can jointly address biodiversity loss and climate change while supporting human health and well-being, particularly in urban contexts. She examines how institutions and stakeholders can work together to co-create, govern, and implement these approaches, and better integrate them into policy and planning. A particular interest is overcoming barriers to implementation and ensuring that NbS deliver equitable and lasting benefits for people and nature.

McKenna currently leads two projects strengthening European cooperation on ecosystem restoration: BioClim-Restoration, fostering international exchange on the links between restoration, biodiversity conservation, and climate action, and the Alpine Biodiversity Action Plan, supporting cross-border restoration planning under the Alpine Convention. She also contributes to GoNaturePositive!,where she mapped EU and global policy and cooperation landscapes to inform pathways towards a nature-positive economy. Her work in FairNature focses on justice and inclusion in scaling NbS, while RELATE4NATURE explores how diverse values of nature can be better reflected in governance and socio-economic systems. 

Beyond her project work, McKenna contributes to biodiversity policy discussions through expert networks, advisory roles and stakeholder dialogue. She has served on the Biodiversa+ Enlarged Stakeholder Board, in the BiodivClim Knowledge Hub on NbS, and contributes as an expert to BioAgora's work to develop the EU Long-term Strategic Research Agenda for Biodiversity. She has also served as an expert reviewer of the IPCC Special Report on Climate Change and Cities and the WHO report Nature-based Solutions and Health. She led the European Commission publication “Co-creating Nature-based Solutions with Commonly Excluded Stakeholders” and supported the High Level EU–Latin America Policy Dialogue on NbS. 

Previously, McKenna coordinated the INTERLACE project, bringing together 21 partners across Europe and Latin America to restore urban ecosystems. She led the development of the Urban Governance Atlas, an interactive database of 250 policy instruments supporting urban NbS and a free MOOC on NbS planning and implementation. She also co-authored the university textbook Urban Nature: New Directions for City Futures. Other completed projects include Natürlich Klimaanpassung!, NATURVATION, CLEVER Cities, NICHES, and ENABLE alongside work for the European Environment Agency’s Topic Centre on Biological Diversity.