GIST Impact was pleased to sponsor Environmental Finance’s annual event in New York on May 16, where over 200 senior leaders in the investment community came together to discuss the future of natural capital and its significance for investors.

Our VP and Head of Biodiversity Products, Thomas Moran participated in an insightful panel on “Understanding Biodiversity Portfolio Risks and Disclosure of Nature-Related Impacts and Dependencies”, alongside experts from WWF, CDP, The Rockefeller Foundation, and Manulife Investment Management.

A few key takeaways from the panel discussion:

• Localisation and geographic specificity are vitally important when assessing nature-related risks and opportunities (as opposed to climate risks that are more universal). Investors really need to understand where an asset is located to fully account for ecosystem and biodiversity impacts and dependencies.
• Disclosure initiatives like the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) and CDP are encouraging more standardised corporate reporting on natural capital impacts, which will help investors better analyse risks as well as opportunities across their portfolios.
• Robust, forward-looking metrics such as potentially disappeared fraction of species (PDF), are critical for helping investors quantify corporate impacts on ecosystems and biodiversity. But challenges remain due to the lack of standardisation and limited asset-level data.
• The panel stressed the relevance of natural capital considerations across all sectors and asset classes, not just those traditionally associated with nature. Investors should be asking where their business interacts with nature and identifying those priority geographies.

Thanks again to Environmental Finance for hosting us and we look forward to continuing these important discussions in the weeks and months to come!

To learn more about GIST Impact’s biodiversity solutions, get in touch at info@gistimpact.com, or check out our website for more info: https://gistimpact.com/biodiversity-solutions/