Following the 12th IPBES Plenary in Manchester last week, the body has published a scientific assessment summary outlining how businesses, governments, financial actors and civil society can respond to their impacts on nature.
It highlights how less than 1% of publicly reporting companies mention biodiversity impacts in their reports, and identifies "important gaps in knowledge" that constrain the ability of all actors to fully understand and effectively manage business activities.
Global public and private finance flows with direct negative impacts on nature were estimated at $7.3trn (£5.3trn) in 2023, according to the report, of which private finance accounted for $4.9trn, and environmentally harmful public subsidies around $2.4trn. In contrast, just $220bn in public and private finance flows were directed towards conservation and restoration of biodiversity during that year.
Furthermore, industrial development threatens 60% of Indigenous lands around the world and a quarter of all Indigenous territories are under high pressure from resource exploitation, with these communities often left out of research and decision making.
The scientific assessment has been prepared over three years by 79 leading experts from 35 countries, with the summary approved by more than 150 governments, warning that biodiversity loss “now poses a critical and pervasive systemic risk to the economy, financial stability and human wellbeing”.
“This report draws on thousands of sources, bringing together years of research and practice into a single integrated framework that shows both the risks of nature loss to business, and the opportunities for business to help reverse this,” said Matt Jones, one of three co-chairs of the assessment.
“This is a pivotal moment for businesses and financial institutions, as well as governments and civil society, to cut through the confusion of countless methods and metrics, and to use the clarity and coherence offered by the report to take meaningful steps towards transformative change."
The assessment summary identifies knowledge gaps hindering companies from managing their nature impacts, which include a lack of: business-relevant data; data accessibility and transparency; completeness of evidence; adoption of methods, and applicability of methods.
This comes after a recent survey among financial institutions representing 30% of global market capitalisation value found that the three greatest barriers to greater uptake of nature-related risk assessment and management are access to reliable data, access to reliable models, and access to scenarios.
The report explores both actions that can be taken by businesses themselves and ‘signalling’ actions that can publicly influence and inspire action by others.
It also recommends over 100 concrete actions for governments, financial actors and civil society, such as eliminating harmful subsidies, supporting new financial instruments for conservation, and setting regulatory frameworks.
ISEP CEO Sarah Mukherjee MBE, and policy and engagement lead for biodiversity and natural capital, Lesley Wilson, attended last week's IPBES conference.
Writing in a new blog, Wilson explains: “This primer for the full assessment report examines different ways companies measure their impacts on biodiversity, as well as the benefits they receive from healthy ecosystems.
“It explores what works, what doesn’t, and how better measurement can lead to better outcomes for both nature and people, and is designed for anyone shaping decisions that influence nature, especially governments, businesses, and organisations within the financial system.”
The full report is expected within the next few months.
Image credit: Shutterstock
Chris Seekings is the Deputy Editor of ISEP’s Transform magazine, which is published biomonthly for ISEP members. Chris’s role involves writing sustainability-related news, features and interviews, as well as helping to plan and manage the magazine’s other day-to-day activities.
