In 1994 Gunter Pauli initiated the Zero Emissions Research Initiative at the United Nations University (Tokyo), supported by the Japanese government. Based on this the ZERI Foundation was founded. The goal of this Foundation, outbound from scientific profound ideas in a global network of creative people, is to find sustainable solutions for society which are inspired by the principals of natures Design.

Based on this background the project "Nature's 100 Best" evolved. To support this project a team of scientists undertook a complete inspection of natural technologies that had been published in peer-reviewed articles. The US-Team identified 2,131 technologies and filtered those that showed a potential to fundamentally alter existing business models. 340 were found that could be bundled into systems functioning the way ecosystems do.

These technologies were then evaluated by a team of business strategists, financial analysts and public policy makers. The criteria used included the stage of development of the project, the amount of intellectual property used and the possibility of contributing to attaining the Millennium goals set by the UN. Also the extent of creating possible places of employment and the speed in which mass markets can be targeted were taken into account.

The one hundred best ideas that are introduced by the book "The Blue Economy®" have systemic elements, which implies that they solve more than one problem at a time instead of focusing on only one aspect. The innovations all base on functioning projects, undertakings or initiatives and therefore, have been tested in practice. Their implementation in hundred of industries and the distribution among countries in the entire world will change the economy as we know it fundamentally – to more sustainability due to a higher added value.