Quartz

October 26, 2022
With little to no progress made in halting and reversing catastrophic biodiversity loss in the past few years, hundreds of companies have stepped up demands for regulations to increase transparency and accountability.

Businesses must be compelled to “assess and disclose their impacts and dependencies on biodiversity by 2030,” more than 330 firms and financial institutions from 56 countries said in an open letter published today (Oct. 26), organized by the Business for Nature coalition and addressed to world leaders. The signatories include Sweden’s furniture giants IKEA, India’s Tata Steel, and French international banking group BNP Paribas, among others.

As some large businesses demand regulations, other big companies have been linked to lobbying attempts to resist such laws. Currently, any biodiversity reportage is largely voluntary and scattered. The statement is urging governments “to transform the rules of the economic game and require business to act now” before COP15 in Montreal in December, where the new Global Biodiversity Framework will be formed.

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Reuters

October 25, 2022
Over 330 businesses on Wednesday urged world leaders to force large companies to assess and disclose their impact on nature by 2030, ahead of the COP15 global talks on biodiversity in December.

Signatories of the COP15 Business Statement, which include GSK (GSK.L), H&M Group (HMb.ST) and Nestle (NESN.S) and which have combined annual revenues of more than $1.5 trillion, said the world needed to move past voluntary reporting rules.

"Improving the health of our planet requires bold, decisive action from policymakers and businesses. Some progress has been made, but it's not enough," Rebecca Marmot, chief sustainability officer at consumer goods company Unilever (ULVR.L), said.

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Fast Company

August 8, 2022
Navigating the investment landscape is increasingly complex. Supply chain issues, soaring inflation, rising energy prices, spiraling cost of raw materials—the list goes on.

Increasingly, “alarming” levels of global biodiversity loss—or, in investment-speak, the permanent destruction of natural capital—must also be taken into account. In fact, the situation has reached a crisis point where investors are now recognizing the direct line of risk between their portfolios and the natural resources they depend on.

All is not lost. As investors finally start to quantify the risk of global biodiversity loss in terms of dollars, it could spark the level of change that has been so urgently needed for so long. Indeed, investment is now being billed as a key area of debate at the upcoming UN COP-15 summit on biodiversity.

Alongside the significant economic opportunity there is of course also a climate imperative on financial companies to halt the ecological destruction of the Earth. Thankfully, these companies are starting to take notice and establish roots in the movement to reverse biodiversity loss.

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World Economic Forum

July 25, 2022
A recent report from The Environment Agency found a quarter of England’s mammals and almost a fifth of UK plants are threatened with extinction. With only an abysmal 50% of biodiversity remaining, the UK today ranks in the bottom ten of all countries globally. The present situation may look grim, but the future is potentially bleaker if we don’t act fast. The UN predicts the colossal extinction of one million species by 2039 - it’s clear we need to take action now to drive the change in the world, and humanity’s very survival, needs.

The absence of an urgent response from global leaders to the crisis has taken the loss of the world’s biodiversity to a crisis point, as it now poses as great a risk to humanity as global warming. Ongoing deprioritisation over more immediate global problems, such as the cost of living crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic has stagnated action and accelerated the loss of biodiversity. The delaying of the world’s foremost biodiversity conference, the COP15 summit, four times is proof of this. But humanity sleepwalking into extinction is a disaster, even if it takes fifteen years, and is worthy of urgent global attention.

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World Economic Forum

May 4, 2022
It has been a tough start to 2022. The war in Ukraine has shaken global geopolitical order and brought immense grief while disrupting supply chains and global economic stability. At the same time, the IPCC has issued dire warnings outlining the devasting consequences of climate change - including on business - if we don’t take urgent action and that the window for action is fast closing.

As the world struggles with political upheaval, we must also hold the long-term view in mind: that peace, a stable climate, and healthy ecosystems are the foundations of thriving and resilient societies and economies. 

The Paris Agreement on climate change was a rallying point for businesses on global warming. Another United Nations initiative that could have the same impact on biodiversity recently concluded its latest round of talks in Geneva. Leading businesses such as Unilever, Citi, Natura &Co, H&M Group, Holcim, GSK, Walmart, IKEA, Nestlé and L’Occitane joined Business for Nature and its partners Capitals Coalition, WBCSD (World Business Council for Sustainable Development), CEBDS and the International Chamber of Commerce, on the ground - the first time so many progressive businesses have turned up at a nature negotiation pushing for greater ambition.

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The CSR Journal

November 20, 2021
We face unprecedented challenges in our world today. The ongoing once-in-a-generation pandemic, to increasingly extreme weather events causing devastation at local and regional scales. The climate crisis causing disasters around the world is due to the imbalance of the carbon cycle, and increase in greenhouse gases from human activity.

The sixth IPCC (United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) report cements the science on the causes. In addition, human activity also has terraformed Earth’s landscapes destroying the natural ecosystems causing biodiversity decline. This further harms the ability of our regenerative Earth systems to maintain stability.

The imbalances in the biosphere affect nature and way of life. The current economic pathway is directly in conflict with nature. It is the source of our life, livelihoods, and economy. Strengthening nature inclusive thinking in business decisions creates a resilient future.

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The Statesman

November 14, 2021
It’s becoming increasingly clear that we not only need to adapt to protect vulnerable communities and natural habitats against climate change but we also need to look to nature as a regenerative solution, not just something that we need to protect, but something that will protect us, Google has stressed.

During the past two weeks at the 2021 UN Climate Change Conference (COP26), world leaders committed to averting the worst consequences of climate change.

“When we observe the Earth’s surface over the past few decades in Google Earth’s Timelapse, the immensity of the change to our natural environment is arresting,” said Nithya Sowrirajan, Director, Global Solutions, Google Earth and Earth Engine.“At Google, we’re keenly invested in preventing the worst effects of climate change, and helping our customers use Google Cloud technology to build a more sustainable future,” added Jen Bennett, Director, Office of CTO, Google Cloud.

It was 11 years ago at COP16 that the tech giant unveiled Google Earth Engine, an earth observation platform that combines a multi-petabyte catalog of satellite imagery and geospatial datasets with powerful analysis capabilities.

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The Independent - OpEd

November 3, 2021
Reversing nature loss by 2030, while also halving greenhouse gas emissions this decade, is critical to avoid climate catastrophe. Nature can contribute up to a third of the climate action needed over the next decade, along with measurable benefits for biodiversity and people.

COP26 is the biggest moment for forests and nature since the Paris Agreement in 2015. Glasgow is producing the largest ever financial incentives for protecting forests, with unprecedented commitments from donor nations, investors and companies. 

Yesterday, more than 30 leading financial institutions, collectively with over US$ 8.7 trillion in assets under management, committed to tackle agricultural commodity-driven deforestation as part of broader efforts to drive the global shift towards sustainable production and nature-based solutions.

On top of that, more than 100 government leaders representing over 85% of the world’s forests committed to halt and reverse deforestation and land degradation by 2030, a pledge that was backed by $12 billions of public fund and more than $7 billion of private commitments, including exciting initiatives like the LEAF Coalition, the Natural Capital Investment Alliance and the Finance for the Amazon, Cerrado and Chaco (IFACC) initiative.

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New York Times

November 2, 2021
Jeff Bezos, one of the richest humans on the planet, and who started his financial empire by selling books online, pledged $2 billion to restoring natural habitats and transforming food systems at the climate summit in Glasgow on Tuesday.

Speaking at a conference where President Biden and other leaders announced a global pact to end deforestation by 2030, Mr. Bezos said that private industry must play a central role in the campaign.

“Amazon aims to power all its operations by renewable energies by 2025,” he said, restating his goal for the company to be carbon-neutral by 2040.

That will be a sizable challenge.

Amazon said, for example, that the company’s emissions from indirect sources had increased 15 percent last year over 2019. The company has pointed out that when its emissions are measured relative to its booming sales, its carbon footprint has been decreasing. But some climate experts say this calculation, called carbon intensity, obscures that the company is still generating an increasing amount of carbon.

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The Print

July 26, 2021
Climate action failure, biodiversity loss and infectious diseases counted as the top three risks in the World Economic Forum’s Global Risks Report. It is imperative that leaders and citizens alike adopt a systems view for the economic and societal transformation needed today so we build the world we want to inhabit in 2030.

In 2015, world leaders came together for an ambitious commitment on fighting climate change to keep the world on a 1.5C pathway. In addition to governments that committed to the Paris Agreement, businesses aligned their plans and commitments to this vision. Companies with a combined revenue of over $11.4 trillion (equivalent to more than half of US GDP), are now pursuing net zero emissions by the end of the century, majority by 2050.

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Edie

July 7, 2021
More than 100 investors, including the likes of Aviva and M&G Investments, representing $4.2trn in assets under management have written to some of the world's biggest banks, calling on them to strengthen climate and biodiversity targets this year.

Convened through the ShareAction coalition, 115 investors have written to 63 leading banks, including JPMorgan Chase, Deutsche Bank and Standard Chartered, calling on them to beef up environmental commitments ahead of key summits this year.

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Project Syndicate

October 13, 2020
From the energy industry to industrial agriculture, the private sector has long reaped large financial rewards from environmental destruction. But the costs of that destruction are growing, and businesses' responsibility – and motivation – to reverse it becoming more apparent.

The latest edition of the United Nations’ Global Biodiversity Outlook, published by the Convention on Biological Diversity, makes for bleak reading. As the report notes, biodiversity is essential to address climate change, ensure long-term food security, and prevent future pandemics. And yet the world is missing every target that has been established to protect it. If this is to change, business must step up.

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Business Green

August 28, 2020
Investors and businesses seeking guidance on how to harness nature based solutions to boost profits and meet sustainability objectives can draw on a new report, titled Nature based solutions to the climate crisis, published yesterday by the Manchester-based Ignition project.

The report analyses a range of nature-based solutions to construction and urban planning challenges: street trees, green roofs and walls, urban parks and green spaces, and sustainable drainage systems.

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edie

July 27, 2020
Scientists have mapped the entirety of the planet's terrestrial habitat, creating a resource that will help businesses and investors measure and minimize their impacts on natural resources and biodiversity.

The map, which claims to be the first of its kind, was published in the journal Biological Conservation late last week following extensive research from scientists at the UN’s Environment Programme arm (UNEP). Before its publication, such in-depth data was only available for areas classed as ‘protected’ and ‘key for biodiversity, which are accountable for just 15.1% and 8.8% of land respectively.

It maps whether each square kilometre of land is classified as ‘natural’ or ‘modified’ – natural habitats being those which have not been created by humans or significantly altered by development activity. As such, users can identify where existing projects can be expanded, or new ones began, with the smallest impact on habitats possible.

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World Economic Forum

July 14, 2020
The Future of Nature and Business, the second of three reports in the World Economic Forum’s New Nature Economy series, provides the practical insights needed to take leadership in shifting towards a much needed nature-positive economy.

As the world prepares to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic and resulting crisis, we are presented with an unprecedented clarion call, and opportunity, to change the way we eat, live, grow, build and power our lives to achieve a carbon-neutral, ‘nature-positive’ economy and halt biodiversity loss by 2030. Business as usual is no longer an option.

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