Businesses across sectors are increasingly striving to meet voluntary or statutory environmental reporting and disclosure requirements for biodiversity. Yet many companies and financial institutions struggle to obtain the biodiversity data they need to define, plan, monitor and report on their environmental impacts, dependencies, risks, and nature-positive outcomes. In addition, while the financial risks of climate change are increasingly scrutinized, the economic implications of nature degradation—such as biodiversity loss, water scarcity, soil degradation and marine pollution—remain poorly understood.

This workshop therefore
- explores the channels through which corporate dependencies and impacts on nature transmit from the real economy side (e.g., production) into financial markets through company valuations and asset prices.
- identifies key challenges and solutions for improving the availability of biodiversity data for business sustainability more broadly.

The workshop will bring together researchers from financial economics, sustainability science, business management, and conservation biology to identify challenges, opportunities and lessons learned from current research and business initiatives.

Participants will present theoretical models and empirical evidence that map the pathways from nature degradation to economic outcomes, focusing on two primary channels: the disruption of ecosystem services vital for production, and the transition risks arising from new environmental regulations, disclosure requirements (e.g., Corporate Sustainability Requirement Directive in Europe, Sustainability Disclosure Standards in the UK), and rising legal challenges on the destruction of nature.
They will also present case studies on the latest biodiversity metrics research and practical examples of biodiversity needs and uses relating to biodiversity credits, renewable energy, agriculture, forestry, fisheries, mining, marine services, and sport.

We will address key questions such as:
- What biodiversity data do businesses need for assessing their impacts and dependencies and monitoring success of nature-positive initiatives?
- How do markets value a company’s reliance on specific ecosystem services like pollination or water filtration? Are there examples of financial losses due to companies’ dependence on degraded ecosystems and that can be observed at the scale of global financial markets?
- Are firms with significant negative impacts on biodiversity facing a higher cost of capital?
This workshop aims to foster an interdisciplinary dialogue on creating robust, actionable frameworks for corporates, investors, and policymakers.

Co-conveners: Fanny Cartellier, Kerrigan Unter, Elsa Almeida