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Purpose - Over the last decade, several innovative business-community partnerships have emerged to address simultaneously two pressing development issues: poverty reduction and biodiversity conservation. The purpose of this paper is to identify relevant models and to propose a first evaluation of these models in relation to development. Design/methodology/approach - The models were identified following a literature review and were evaluated using Amartya Sen's definition of poverty. Findings - The paper identifies two models: the local enterprise model and the global investment model. While the local model relies mainly on local resources, the global investment model includes local and global organizations and institutions. The paper has analyzed the respective impacts of these new business-community partnerships, including their governance schemes, on communities and ecosystems through the lens of Amartya Sen's definition of poverty and development. The key finding is double. First, both these models are still in their very early stages. Second, the paper has identified the strengths and weaknesses of each of these models: while the global investment model provides access to solid and important financial resources and markets, the local enterprise model emphasizes local empowerment. Originality/value - This paper reports innovative initiatives and models of governance that could inspire future private sector based approaches to biodiversity conservation and poverty reduction and help build the theoretical bases for such approaches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]