Biodiversity and Nature High on Davos 2025 Agenda

This issue’s Top Story predicts that a welcome turning point is upon us – rather than a tipping point. Experts with the World Economic Forum (WEF) have come away from the annual meeting in Davos foretelling a rise in global financing for nature, which could clear the way to meet 2030 biodiversity targets.

The WEF meetings in Davos, Switzerland, are an annual gathering of influential figures from business, government, and the social sector. At this year’s WEF, climate change and other sustainability issues remained high on the agenda. One discussion panel highlighted the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF), which was adopted by 196 countries in December 2022. The Framework sets a goal of reversing the rate of biodiversity loss by 2030 through 23 near-term targets, and achieving four overarching goals by 2050.

The panel discussed changes the GBF could mean for sectors like manufacturing, agriculture, energy, tourism, mining, automotive, fishing, and ports management.

Following the Davos meetings, WEF experts interviewed for the Top Story offer hope for financing the ambitious targets of the GBF, with financial sector participation seen as key to achieving the 2030 targets. A major strategy to reach these targets is to remove existing harmful subsidies from the world’s capital flows. A substantial number of investors, lenders, bankers, and other financial actors would need to change how they operate to support this strategy. To date, 194 financial institutions have endorsed the “Finance for Biodiversity Pledge,” promising to align their business operations with nature-positive goals. Actions taken so far include new policies on deforestation from HSBC and Standard Chartered.

But financial institutions are unlikely to take more impactful action or change strategic course without good data to point the way. The EU’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) and the Task Force on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) provide frameworks that institutions can rely on to advance the data collection and reporting needed to effectively measure nature-related risks. Indeed, the TNFD was designed to enable the achievement of the GBF’s policy goals while being consistent with reporting standards from the International Sustainability Standards Board (ISSB) and Global Reporting Institute (GRI). A current theme among reporting standards is alignment with the GBF to ensure that biodiversity-related disclosures advance the agreed targets and goals. The readiness of relevant data and disclosures is one factor in the expected turning point towards nature financing.

Another promising factor is the robust foundation of climate-related financial systems built by institutions over the past nine years. The WEF reports that since the Paris Agreement was adopted in 2015, the financial sector has been investing in teams and systems to handle sustainability issues, and they can now adapt those resources to address biodiversity. Laura Fisher, WEF, notes that “the financial systems that institutions have built for climate can be expanded to nature with relatively limited additional resources, making it an efficient and impactful transition."

The G&A Institute team is firmly focused on biodiversity issues and topics, and we are tracking the realignment of global and domestic reporting frameworks and standards for corporations. We help clients respond to stakeholder requests for information on biodiversity impacts and adapt their business strategies for nature-positive impacts. For more information contact us at info@ga-institute.com.

Introducing "Staying the Course"
We've added a new feature focusing on "staying the course" and "good news" related to reporting standards, ESG investing, sustainability data, and climate action around the world.

This is just the introduction of G&A's Sustainability Highlights newsletter this week. Click here to view the full issue.