An emerging investment theme: biodiversity
It might seem odd to describe biodiversity as an emerging theme, after all its been one of the bedrocks of the Environmental and Social pillars of ESG for some time now.
Summary: It might seem odd to describe biodiversity as an emerging theme, after all its been one of the bedrocks of the Environmental and Social pillars of ESG for some time now. And the success of television programmes such as Sir David Attenborough's Our Planet , has raised the profile of the theme with the general public. And yet, its not really been seen by many as a separate investment theme. But that is now changing. In this Perspective we introduce biodiversity as an investment theme, with more blogs to follow.
Why this is important: It's now largely (but not universally) understood that addressing the the wider issue of combating climate change. We expect biodiversity to become similarly important for companies and investors over the next few years.
The big theme: The concept of double materiality has started to take hold - the notion that as well as considering the impact of external E,S & G factors on a company, we also need to take account of the impact that a company has on the wider world. This has led to the discussion of human rights risks and opportunities to shift into the mainstream. We expect biodiversity to follow a similar path, making this an issue that companies, investors and asset owners all need to learn about.
The details
Summary of a blog from the CCLI
The Commonwealth Climate and Law Initiative (CCLI) asked in a recent blog, can you price pollination ? The background to this is the understanding that human-induced species extinction and the resulting decline in biodiversity threatens the economic and financial systems on which we rely. Changing investment flows to align with and drive a nature-compatible financial system is a necessity – and we are now starting to see the required tools emerge.
