Nature of Risk

Nature of Risk: A Framework for Understanding Nature-Related Risk to Business
The Nature of Risk

A Framework for Understanding Nature-Related Risk to Business
Authors
Samantha McCraine, Christa Anderson, Christopher Weber, M. Rebecca Shaw
Acknowledgements
We acknowledge the following people who kindly provided input to or
review of this report. The views expressed here, however, may not
represent the views of reviewers.
Elizabeth Aceituno, Hugo Bluet, Jane Chu, Rosie Dunscombe,
Giulietta Duyck, Karen Ellis, Magnus Emfel, Stefano Esposito,
Sebastien Godinot, Jiska Klein, Margaret Kuhlow, Raj Kundra,
Katie Leach, Joanne Lee, Alexis Morgan, Anders Nordheim,
Toby Roxburgh, Siobhan Stewart, Jakob Thoma, Jorien van Hoogen
Report design: weirdesign.com
© 2019 World Wildlife Fund
The Nature of Risk

Table of Contents
Executive Summary 4
1. Context of the Report 10
2. Literature Summary 11
3. Framework for Understanding Nature-Related Risk to Business 13
3.1 Nature 13
3.2 Business Risk 14
3.3 Nature-Related Risks to Business 15
Illustrating Nature-Related Risk with the ENCORE Database 16
4. Types of Nature-Related Risk for Business 17
4.1 Risk Type Frequencies 17
4.2 Connecting Threats and Consequences 19
5. Case Studies of Nature-Related Risk to Business 22
5.1 Case Study 1: BP Oil Spill 23
5.2 Case Study 2: Collapse of Vale’s Brumadinho Dam 24
5.3 Case Study 3: German exporters in South Africa 25
5.4 Case Study 4: PG&E Bankruptcy 26
5.5 Case Study Summary 26
6. Opportunities and Future Work 27
7. Annexes 1-3 29
8. References 40
mindset.3 Climate-related risk and nature-related risk

are not separate entities; the loss of nature decreases
Executive Summary climate resilience, and climate change exacerbates
drivers of nature loss.4,5
The case for considering environmental
degradation as a risk—to business, finance, However, action on nature-related risk has been
and society as a whole—is constantly fragmented, in part because of an array of competing
getting stronger. concepts and frameworks for understanding the
financial materiality of nature and its services. This
The recent Global Assessment released by the report provides a synthesis framework for nature-
Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on related risk, consolidating work from over 70 sources.
Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) supplied We build on the years of study done by environmental
clear indicators of the loss of nature and the decline of economists, corporate risk managers, and climate
ecosystem services—valued in the hundreds of trillions scientists, as well as the momentum fueled by the Task
of dollars—which provide the basic building blocks of Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD).
the global economy, from water to energy, and food to As attention grows around climate change-related risk
carbon sequestration. to business, there is a need for nature-related risk to be
This decline in ecosystem services is even more considered in parallel.
important as climate-related risk becomes a growing Together, the loss of nature and climate change are the
concern for business and finance: In organizations from “twin emergencies” facing humanity;6 turning a blind eye
central banks1 to individual businesses,2 climate-related to either can leave businesses vulnerable and exposed
risks have quickly risen to the top of the corporate to risks.
Framework for Understanding risk awareness (including definitions of materiality),

Nature-Related Risk to Business degree of operational and managerial resilience, value
chain and/or product diversification, and influence on the
This framework brings together concepts related to its
market/within the sector (including pricing power and
two constituent terms: nature and risk (Figure ES1).
brand value). Where a threat, vulnerability, and exposure
Within our framework, businesses connect to nature
are all present, a financial consequence to the business
in two primary ways: Through their dependencies on
may materialize. At the business level, this consequence
nature—businesses’ reliance on ecosystem services and
can take the form of operational disruption, an increase
natural capital; and through their impacts on nature—
in costs, a decrease in sales, or an increase in the cost of
the positive or negative effects of businesses’ activity on
capital. Many times, these costs may be borne in part by
nature. For businesses, a change in these dependencies
other actors, such as investors, nearby communities, and
and impacts can become nature-related risk (NRR)
other companies in their industry.
when that change creates a threat. Threats become
financially material or consequential if the company These dynamics of risk creation are common to nature-
also has some degree of exposure and vulnerability to related risks and climate change-related risks. That is,
the threat. At the business level, exposure is a function both are concerned with the consequences of a threat
of factors like the business’s sector and industry (the becoming material due to exposure and vulnerability
practices of these, and proximity to consumers and in the face of an (unexpected) change in operating
regulators), the geographic spread of their value chain conditions.
(with implications for their legal jurisdictions and their
Factoring nature-related risks into decision-making
sociopolitical contexts of operation), and finally their
can help companies anticipate threats and prepare
(degree of) reliance on ecosystem services or natural
for consequences by reducing their exposure and
capital. Vulnerability of individual businesses to nature-
vulnerability. In a changing world, this preparedness
related threats can generally be thought of as the (in)
enables better response times, resource availability and
ability of the business to adapt to the threat at hand; this
efficiency, optimization of products, and decreases in
includes factors like size, expendable capital (or cash on
additional fines or costs.
hand), risk management practices along the value chain,
Figure ES1. High level framework illustrating nature related risk to business
DEPENDENCY-
RELATED DEPENDENCIES
CHANGE ON NATURE
VULNERABILITY
THREAT
NATURE-
RELATED CONSEQUENCE
$
RISK MICRO:
NATURE BUSINESS MACRO:
ECONOMY
EXPOSURE
IMPACT-RELATED IMPACTS
CHANGE ON NATURE
Framework of nature-related risk. This framework for nature-related risk combines two ideas. The first is how businesses and the economy both
impact and depend on nature (outer gray arrows). The second is that nature-related risk arises from not just the change to impacts and dependen-
cies on nature (striped circles), leading to a threat (orange circles), but also from a business’s exposure and vulnerability (blue and yellow circles) 8.
When a nature-related risk is realized, there may be a consequence to the business and to the broader economy. These consequences may trigger
feedbacks on the company’s vulnerability and exposure or may create further threats related to its impacts and dependencies on nature.
Adopted and integrated from NCFA & UNEP-WCMC 2018, Field et al. 2014
Types of Nature-Related Risk to Business Separating risk into threats and consequences highlights
two elements of risk for businesses: 1) how a risk might
In addition to considering the components that make
arise (the threat, Table ES1a), and also 2) how it becomes
up nature-related risk, we assess different types of
material to the business or investors (the consequence).
nature-related risks that are of concern for business.
This is a simple distinction largely missing from the
This review of the most commonly mentioned threats
current conversation.
and consequences provides an indicator of which risks
are most likely to be material for businesses (further Our data indicates that twice as many threats are being
details in Annex 1). assessed as compared to consequences, and that
consequences on average receive slightly more attention
Based on our review of 30 frameworks, we group nature-
per specific type than threats.
related risk into five major types: physical, regulatory &
legal, market, reputational, and financial risks. While
the first four risk types can be further separated into
threats and consequences, financial risks are almost
always consequences of concern rather than threats.
Table ES1a. Top cited examples of nature-related threats across reviewed sources
RISK TYPES THREAT TYPE TOTAL
Physical Risk 11
Acute events; damage from natural/man-made hazards 11
Biodiversity loss and decreasing species richness 7
Scarcity of water 4
Availability, reliability, and security of energy 4
Habitat loss 2
Air pollution 2
Water pollution 2
Regulatory & Legal Risk 14

Litigation, damages, and/or compensation 11
Pricing or other regulations for emissions (GHG*/other) 10
Restrictions on land and ES access 6
Air pollution regulation 6
Non-hazardous waste management 6
Soil pollution regulation 6
Resource quotas for ES use 4
Unsustainable practices 4
Changing liability regimes 3
Hazardous waste management 3
Water pollution regulation 3
Changes in disclosure requirements 2
Market Risk 10
Changing consumer preferences 7
Inability to attract co-financiers due to uncertainty 2
Purchaser requirements 2
Reputational Risk 13
Negative press coverage 3
Divestment or other stakeholder campaigns 3
Impacts on World Heritage Sites or protected areas 2
Impacts on species on IUCN** Red List 2
Physical Risk Regulatory & Legal Risk Market Risk Reputational Risk
*GHG – Greenhouse gas

** IUCN – International Union for Conservation of Nature
Table ES1b. Most cited consequences of nature-related risks across reviewed sources
RISK TYPES CONSEQUENCE TYPE TOTAL
Physical Risk Disruptions to business operations 7

Labor shortages 5
Regulatory & Legal Risk Unexpected costs of compliance/fines for noncompliance 9

Stranded assets 4
Market Risk Changes in the cost and availability of resources 4
Reputational Risk Lost sales due to negative perceptions of the institution 3
Financial Risk Increased cost of capital or lending requirements 5

Write-downs of asset value and write-offs of assets 5
Increased insurance claims 4
Higher premiums; loss of insurance value 4
Increased risk of default 3
Loss of investment value related to reputational risks 2
Changes in market value of the business 2
Physical Risk Regulatory & Legal Risk Market Risk Reputational Risk Financial Risk
Case Studies of Nature-Related Risk showcase positive actions (of companies proactively
assessing their natural capital dependencies). In this
While case studies of nature-related risk to businesses
report, we include cases which are emblematic, instances
do exist, they are limited in number, in part because
in which an actual risk event occurred. We outline these
business are reluctant to voluntarily share risk
cases using the framework outlined in the paper.
information. Those published by business typically
Table ES2. Summary of selected case studies of nature-related risk and consequences for business
BUSINESS CHANGE IN DEPENDENCIES THREAT VULNERABILITY EXPOSURE CONSEQUENCE(S)

OR IMPACTS
BP Impacts of the oil spill Damage to Risk assessment (-); Types of activities Legal costs at around
surrounding brand value (+) undertaken (e.g., USD 62.59–144.89 billion;
environment deepwater drilling); loss of USD 3.7 billion in
operations in marine revenue; drop in market
environment cap and share prices;
increased insurance rates
across the industry
Vale Growing awareness about Collapse of the Risk assessment (-); Environmental Suspension of operations;
the dangers of “upstream” tailings dam brand reputation (-) conditions USD 2.3 billion
tailings dams in assets frozen;
employees arrested;
drops in share value
and bond prices; down-
graded credit ratings
German Depletion of South African Crop failures Diversification of Distance from primary EUR 70 million in
exporters water sources; drought suppliers and diversified production; geography forgone sales/profits
products (+) of supply chain;
sociopolitical mood in
home and host countries
PG&E Increased dryness in Sparks on the Risk assessment (-) Types of activities under- Over USD 30 billion in
the environment; power lines taken (e.g., power trans- liabilities; bankruptcy
malfunctioning mission); environmental
equipment conditions of operation
This report focuses primarily on nature-related risks to business and to discuss nature-related opportunities
businesses, analyzing recent gray literature on nature- for businesses in detail. As well, key areas of interest for
related risk, categorizing and explaining nature-related further research include the nexus of nature-related and
risks to businesses. Future work is needed to address climate change-related risks, in addition to the dynamics
nature-related risks to society and the entire economy, of systemic risk creation across micro and macro scales
to review academic literature on nature-related risk, to and between nature and climate.
quantify the financial impact of nature-related risks to
List of Abbreviations
CCRR Climate Change-Related Risk

CSR Corporate Social Responsibility
ENCORE Exploring Natural Capital Opportunities,
Risks, and Exposure
ESG Environment, Society, and Governance
FI Financial Institution
IPBES Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform
on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services
IPCC The Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change
NCC Natural Capital Coalition
NCFA Natural Capital Financial Alliance
NRR Nature-Related Risk
TCFD Task Force on Climate-Related
Financial Disclosures
10
List of Definitions ability to yield a flow of benefits to people under specific

conditions of management.10
Consequence – to businesses and other actors occur
only if threats or risks are not managed. Consequences Nature – refers to “all non-human living entities and
affect a business’s cash flow and profitability by their interaction with other living or non-living physical
disrupting its operations directly or affecting its costs, entities and processes.”4 We use this term to encompass
sales, and/or cost of capital (i.e., credit rating, both NC stocks and ES flows.
equity value).
Nature-Related Risk (NNR) – refers to risks which arise
Dependency – a business’s reliance on or use of nature when a change in a business’s impacts or dependencies on
where nature functions as an input, or if it enables, nature become a threat to that business’s operations and
enhances, or influences environmental conditions profitability due to factors of exposure and vulnerability.
required for successful corporate performance.11, 7
Physical Risk – risks that arise from material
Ecosystem Services (ES) – the flows of beneficial and destruction—such as damage to infrastructure and
detrimental contributions that people derive from disruption of operations—causing economic and
nature.4 financial losses for businesses and investors. Physical
risk can be further classified into those that are event-
Exposure – the presence of a company’s operations in driven (“acute”) or longer-term in nature (“chronic”),
places and settings that could be adversely affected by following the Financial Stability Board.10
a threat.8* For a business, determinants of exposure
include factors like the business’s sector and industry Regulatory & Legal Risk – risks relating to laws, policies,
(the practices of these, and proximity to consumers and regulations, and court actions that affect the operations
regulators), the geographic spread of their value chain of businesses.11, 7
(with implications for their legal jurisdictions and their
Reputational Risk – risks that relate to a company’s
sociopolitical contexts of operation), and finally their
brand, image, and relationship with customers, the
general public, and other stakeholders.11, 7
capital. Exposure is the sum of “elements at risk” to any
given threat occurring within a business’s operating Risk – refers to a probabilistic concern with the
conditions. consequences to business of a threat arising from a
change.8*
Financial Risk – these risks are most often an outcome
of the four primary risk types. This risk can be broken Threat – the result of an event or change in the
into two subsets, depending upon whether it accrues to business’s operating conditions that may jeopardize
businesses or financial institutions—we use financing business value or profitability.8*
risk for the former and financier risk for the latter.
Vulnerability – the propensity or predisposition of
Impacts – a positive or negative effect of business a business to be adversely affected by threats in its
activity on the quantity or quality of NC stocks or ES.11, 7 operating conditions.8* For a business, determinants of
vulnerability include size, expendable capital (or cash on
Market Risk – risks that “relate to product and service
hand), risk management practices along the value chain,
offerings, customer preferences, and other market
risk awareness (including definitions of materiality),
factors that can affect corporate performance.”11
degree of operational and managerial resilience, value
Materiality – is any information which is capable of chain and/or product diversification, and influence on
making a difference to the evaluation and analysis at the market/within the sector (including pricing power
hand;12 any definition of materiality should correspond and brand value). A business’s vulnerability can mediate
to the information needs of the stakeholders for the both threats and exposure.
report or publication in question. Material issues in this
context are those that can threaten profits and may *All definitions from Field et al., 2014 were adapted to reflect a focus
on nature-related risks to business, in contrast to the original paper’s
potentially lead to losses for shareholders. focus on climate-related risks to society.
Natural Capital (NC) – is a “way of thinking about the

This list is paired with extended discussion of key terms in Annex 2.
relationship between nature and the economy/society.”9
It refers to the stock of renewable and nonrenewable
natural resources—e.g. plants, animals, air, water, soil,
and minerals—that directly or indirectly might have the
11
At the same time, so do businesses’ dependencies—the

ways in which businesses rely on nature and nature’s
services. With a growing population demanding ever
greater supplies of Earth’s resources, corporations’
impacts and dependencies on nature are likely to
continue to expand. Demands on nature will require
trade-offs; for example, most scenarios predict that
continued increases in the production of food and feed
will occur at the expense of clean water, pollination, and
climate regulation.4 Already, 9 out of the 16 categories
of ecosystem services surveyed by IPBES show a decline
in output over the past five decades.4 Most models,
including business as usual and those with moderate
policy intervention, predict a continued decrease in
biodiversity across marine, freshwater, and terrestrial
ecosystems, trends that have direct negative implications
1. Context of the Report for agriculture, aquaculture, global fisheries, and the
tourism industry as well as indirect implications for other
The case for considering environmental degradation as
sectors of the economy.
a risk—to business, finance, and society as a whole—is
constantly getting stronger. This decline in ecosystem services is even more
important in a context of growing concern with climate-
Earlier this summer, the Global Assessment released
related risk: In organizations from central banks1 to
by the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on
individual businesses,2 climate-related risks have quickly
Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) made waves
risen to the top of the corporate mindset.3
when it announced that “much of nature has already
been lost, and what remains is continuing to decline.”4 Climate-related risk and nature-related risk are not
To date, 70% of land systems, 50% of freshwater, and separate entities; nature loss decreases climate
40% of oceans and seas have been significantly altered.4 resilience, and climate change exacerbates drivers
As for the value of that loss, previous estimates of of nature loss.4,16 Not only can changes in land use
nature’s value in monetary terms put it at USD 125-145 exacerbate climate change (by transforming greenhouse
trillion/year in 2011.13 gas “sinks” into “sources”), but climate change can also
challenge the provision of ecosystem services through
For example, agriculture is at the core of the global
desertification and flooding.5
economy and human life, yet the pollination that allows
crop production to continue is one of the ecosystem Together, the loss of nature and climate change are the
services found to be in decline globally. Currently, “USD “twin emergencies” facing humanity;6 turning a blind eye
235-577 billion worth of annual global food production to either can leave businesses vulnerable and exposed to
relies on direct contributions by pollinators.”14 The loss risks posed by changes just over the horizon.
of pollinators—which is already observed and predicted
to increase—”would result in an estimated annual net Drawing on the momentum of efforts to understand
loss in welfare of USD 160-191 billion globally to crop and address nature-related risk from OECD, NCFA,
consumers, and an additional loss of USD 207-497 NCC, UNEP FI, and UNEP-WCMC, this report provides
billion to producers and consumers in other markets.”15,4 an overview of nature-related risk (NRR). We show
Without a reliable supply of food, increases in disease how nature loss and degradation can materially affect
and deficiency can be expected to slowly erode the businesses and present a systematic way of thinking
labor force in many parts of the world, threatening through nature-related risk. In doing so, we address
development gains and the stability of economic some of the complications that may otherwise stall
growth.a This example points toward the reality that improvements in corporate risk management.b
different business sectors’ impacts on ecosystem services
have effects across the economy.
a.
The health dimension of nature-related risks is not included in this report; however, some attention is given in Annex 2. See UNEP-WCMC, 2019 (in prep), “Exploring the
potential of ENCORE as a tool for planetary health: characterizing the relationships between economic sectors, natural systems and human health and well-being.”
b.
It is not uncommon to find a passage in a report alluding to the disincentives to corporate action posed by the complexity of nature-related issues. See: https://www.cusp.
ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017-11-Increasing-investment-in-natural-capital.pdf.
12
Based on a review of over 70 sources, the following

sections present 1) a framework of nature-related risk
(Section 3; Annex 2); 2) a typology of nature-related
risk (Section 4), as well as a frequency assessment of
these types; and 3) an evidence base of case studies
to illustrate the framework and experience of nature-
related risk (Section 5). Opportunities for further work
are discussed in Section 6.
This report focuses specifically on understanding nature-

related risks to businesses, leaving further work on
analyzing academic literature and quantifying risks for
individual businesses for future endeavors (see summary
table below).
What this report does What this report doesn’t do

• Focuses primarily on nature-related • Focuses primarily on nature-related
risks to businesses risks to society or the entire economy
• Analyzes recent gray literature on • Analyzes recent academic literature on
nature-related risk nature-related risk
• Categorizes and explains nature-related • Quantifies financial impact of nature-
risks to businesses related risks to businesses
• Discusses nature-related risk to • Discusses nature-related opportunities
businesses in detail for businesses in detail
2. Literature Summary A number of reports focus on methods for identifying

This report was compiled from a desk review of relevant nature-related risks to businesses19,7 or on proposing
literature focused on non-academic reports. These options for businesses to report on their nature-related
comprise a significant share of what exists on nature- risks.20, 9 Many also categorize types of nature-related
related risk for businesses. A separate literature review risk21,10 and include frameworks detailing how nature-
focused on academic literature on nature-related risk is related risks accrue to businesses.11
forthcoming from WWF.
Most of the sources surveyed were concerned with
A large number of reports have been published in recent nature-related risk across business sectors rather
years on nature-related risk to businesses. This literature than focusing on one sector. Many sources rank
falls into three main groups: 1) reports focusing on sectors against one another,18,19,22–27 providing useful
natural capital, ecosystem services, or biodiversity; 2) information for investors and regulators, as well as
reports focusing on climate-related risk; and 3) reports for businesses eager to understand the risks posed
that cover environmental risk broadly, as a component to themselves and their competitors. Our survey of
of businesses’ environment, social, and governance (ESG) sources with sector-specific data revealed the following
considerations. sectors to face the greatest nature-related risk: food
and beverage, metals and mining, oil and gas, utilities,
Across these categories, most of the literature has been
forestry, construction, and transportation (See Annex
written by nonprofits and multilateral organizations that
1.2 for data). Although different sources qualify high-risk
are specifically interested in nature-related risk, many
sectors with different terms, common elements include
of which are either nature focused17,9 or focused on the
the number of material issues a sector has related to
nature-business intersection.7 A much smaller group
nature, the number of processes which have material
of reports have been written by businesses or financial
dependencies on ecosystem services, the number of
institutions interested in nature-related risk.3,18
ecosystem services that are highly material to business
13
and the amount of proactive risk mitigation undertaken.

The only sector consistently identified as low risk for
nature-related issues was telecommunications. However, 3. Framework for Understanding
all sector-level studies pointed to a range of responsible
behaviors and risk management practices within as
Nature-Related Risk to Business
well as across sectors. Not only certain sectors but also We provide a framework for understanding nature-
companies are more active at mitigating risk and others related risk (NRR) to business based on our review.
more active at disclosing risk.23 Given that NRR deals with multiple fields of study and
expertise, we briefly define its key elements in order to
At the business level, most case studies focus on provide common ground for addressing nature-related
proactive risk management practices. Conducting such risks to business.
studies can help increase brand value (see our collection
of case studies). Approaches to nature-related risk at The concepts constituting our framework of nature-
the business level include assessing the value of nature related risk are strategically selected as the most
where a business is located;28 environmental profit and authoritative terms to communicate key concepts.
loss accounting;29 assessments of businesses’ natural Additional details on these terms, including distinctions
capital dependencies and impacts; integrating indicators between similar terms, are available in Annex 2.
into corporate performance objectives;30 and strategically 3.1 Nature
selecting risk management options.31,32
As a concept, natural capital (NC) is a “way of thinking
Many different actors have attempted to value and about the relationship between nature and the
measure the worth and availability of natural capital. economy/society.”43 It refers to the stock of renewable
This may be done at the micro/company level,33 on and nonrenewable natural resources (including plants,
a regional19 or geographic level,34 on a macro/global animals, air, water, soil, and minerals) that directly or
level,35,13 or as a cross-scalar analysis.36,c The primary indirectly might have the ability to yield a flow of benefits
complications for such exercises are the location- to people under specific conditions of management.10
specificity of biodiversity (data limitations), natural Given that NC is the primary building block of all other
capital values and the inherent diversity of values capital stocks—financial, manufactured, social/relational,
attributed to nature/natural capital (diversity of uses), human and intellectual—and economic activity,44
and the complexity of ecosystem components (natural degradation of NC can threaten all elements of the
complexity). Nonetheless, systematic attempts to value economy.
nature include Total Ecosystem Valuation35,13,37 and the
Corporate Ecosystem Service Review.11 Multiple groups In contrast to NC, ecosystem services (ES) can be
have worked to quantify the value of nature-related risks thought of as the flows of beneficial and detrimental
to business,38–40 but further work remains in this area for contributions that people derive from nature.4 These
bridging valuation and decision-making. are commonly categorized in terms of provisioning (e.g.,
food and fiber), regulating (e.g., climate), supporting
The literature that is focused on climate-related risk (e.g., soil quality) and cultural (e.g., sense of place) ES.45
has made greater progress in quantifying the costs of There may be negative associations between different
these risks,41,42 particularly those which are physical ES and the sectors of the economy that rely on them;
risks. Climate-related transition risks, or the risks to for example, more fiber for textiles or other consumer
businesses associated with decarbonizing the economy, goods could result in less habitat or shelter availability
are more difficult to address. More broadly, transition for species that are critical for industries reliant on
risks “encompass the risks from large-scale adjustments biodiversity, like tourism.4
triggered by policymaking, new institutional and/
or technical settings, and market structure.”10 While Together, natural capital and ecosystem services
transition risk has so far been associated with climate- underpin the economy; they also collectively constitute
related risk, potential may exist for a similar ecological nature. This report uses the term nature to refer to
transition risk. The scientific literature is strengthening “all non-human living entities and their interaction
the case for addressing climate-related risks and with other living or non-living physical entities and
nature-related risks in unison;4,16 to date, the non- processes.”4 Biodiversity is another term commonly
academic literature on the intersection of these two used in considering nature and nature-related risk to
realms is sparse. businesses; see Annex 2 for details.
c.
Coming later in 2019, the Water and Value (WAVE) tool will help bolster cross-scalar analysis. See: https://waterriskfilter.panda.org/en/Value/ValuePotentiallyAffectedTool.
14
Figure 1. The relationship between nature business value or profitability. However, in order for the
and business consequence to materialize, businesses must be both
exposed and vulnerable to that threat, and also must
DEPENDENCIES
have an insufficient response to the threat.
ON NATURE
Figure 2. Risk arises from the combination of three
factors: a threat, an exposure to that threat, and
vulnerability to that threat
$ VULNERABILITY
MICRO:
BUSINESS MACRO:
NATURE ECONOMY
THREAT RISK
IMPACTS
ON NATURE
Adopted from NCFA & UNEP-WCMC, 2018 EXPOSURE
As highlighted in Figure 1 (adopted from NCFA &
UNEP-WCMC, 2018), the relationship between nature
and business is one of impacts and dependencies. Adopted from Field et al., 2014
A dependency is a business reliance on or use of nature Threats become financially material or consequential if
where nature functions as an input, or if it enables, the company also has some degree of exposure (blue
enhances, or influences environmental conditions circle) and vulnerability (yellow circle) to the threats.
required for successful corporate performance.11,7 At the business level, exposure is a function of factors
An impact on nature is a positive or negative effect including the business’s sector and industry (the
of business activity on the quantity or quality of NC practices of these, and proximity to consumers and
stocks or ES flows.11,7 In this way, nature-related risks to regulators), the geographic spread of their value chain
business arise from their dependencies or impacts (with implications for their legal jurisdictions and their
on nature. sociopolitical contexts of operation), and finally their
3.2 Business Risk capital. Vulnerability of individual businesses to nature-
Our understanding of nature-related risks to business related risk can generally be thought of as the (in)ability
is also shaped by the literature on climate-related risks8 of the business to adapt to the threat at hand; it is a
and corporate risk management. Recognizing that function of determinants like size, expendable capital
the nature-related risks which corporate actors focus (or cash on hand), risk management practices along
on in any given reporting period are a byproduct of the value chain, risk awareness (including definitions
issue materiality,d we employ the following terms to of materiality), degree of operational and managerial
understand the creation of nature-related risks resilience, value chain and/or product diversification,
more broadly. and influence on the market/within the sector (including
pricing power and brand value).
Given that nature-related risks to business arise from
their dependencies or impacts on nature (Figure 1), it Consequences affect a business’s cash flow and
follows that a business’s concern with risk is centered profitability by disrupting its operations directly or
on the consequences of a threat resulting from a affecting its costs, sales, and/or cost of capital (such as
dependency or impact of their value chain. credit rating or equity value). A change in the cost of
capital also implies that risk is likely to be felt by the
The threat consists of an event or change in the company’s investors and creditors, since it affects the
business’s operating conditions, which may jeopardize value of the company’s equity or debt.
d.
See an extended discussion on materiality in Annex 2.
15
3.3 Nature-Related Risks to Business circle) may emerge from changes in policies, consumer
preferences, adverse media coverage of a company’s
Taking together this understanding of risk (Figure 2) with
impacts, and other sources, as detailed below.
that of businesses’ and society’s relationship with nature
(Figure 1), we present the following way of thinking When threat, vulnerability, and exposure are all
through the emergence of nature-related risk (Figure 3). present, a nature-related risk can materialize and lead
to consequences for the business and/or the economy.
Starting from the outside (right side of figure),
These dynamics of risk creation are common to both
businesses, and the economy as a whole, both are
nature-related risks and climate change-related risks.
dependent on and impact nature (left side of figure).
That is, both are concerned with the consequences
These dependencies and impacts on nature vary across
of a threat becoming material due to exposure and
the micro and macro scales; the difference in these
vulnerability in the face of an (unexpected) change in
impacts is illustrated in the size difference of the gray
operating conditions.
causal arrows.
Factoring nature-related risks into decision-making can
Nature-related risk emerges from changes in these
help companies anticipate potential threats and prepare
dependencies and impacts, which may be threats (red
for potential consequences, thereby reducing their
circles). Dependency-related changes (upper striped
exposure and vulnerability. In a changing world, this
circle) emerge from a combination of natural variability
preparedness enables better response times, resource
in ecosystem services and environmental change—
availability and efficiency, optimization of products, and
including climate change, nature loss and degradation,
decreases in additional fines or costs.
and the combination of the two—that humans add
to nature. Impact-related changes (lower striped
Figure 3. High-level framework illustrating nature-related risk to business
DEPENDENCY-
RELATED DEPENDENCIES
CHANGE ON NATURE
VULNERABILITY
THREAT
NATURE-
RELATED CONSEQUENCE
$
RISK MICRO:
NATURE BUSINESS MACRO:
ECONOMY
EXPOSURE
IMPACT-RELATED IMPACTS
CHANGE ON NATURE
Figure 3: High level framework illustrating nature-related risk to business, adopted and integrated from NCFA & UNEP-WCMC 2018, Field
et al., 2014. The framework illustrates how businesses and the economy both impact and depend on nature (outer gray arrows). As well,
it conveys how nature-related risk arises from not just the change to a business’s impacts and dependencies on nature (striped circles),
leading to a threat (orange circles), but also from a business’s exposure and vulnerability (blue and yellow circles). When a nature-relate
risk is realized, there may be a consequence to the business and to the broader economy. These consequences may trigger feedbacks on
the company’s vulnerability and exposure, or on further threats related to its impacts and dependencies on nature.
16
Nature-related risks are emergent: While we know of The ENCORE tool (profiled below) can be used for
some nature-related risks that may have impacts for unpacking nature-related risks to businesses. This
companies in the near term and others that may have tool employs one of the most extensive sets of risk
impacts in the long term, many nature-related risks indicators we encountered across tools and disclosure
remain unknown. To hedge against these, businesses frameworks surveyed.
must be proactive.
Illustrating Nature-Related Risk with the ENCORE Database

The ENCORE tool was developed by the Natural Capital Finance Alliance in partnership with UNEP-WCMC to help
users understand and visualize the impact of environmental change on the economy. Specifically, it connects the
goods and services that nature provides with the idea of business risk if environmental degradation disrupts such
dependencies. By connecting businesses’ dependencies on nature and rating their potential materiality (from
very low to very high), ENCORE illustrates some of the main concepts of nature-related risks. ENCORE’s further
development over the next year will see the inclusion of impact-related risks as well.
Figure 4. ENCORE data, provided by Natural Capital Finance Alliance and UNEP-WCMC
Degrees of Vulnerability
Substitutes for
ES Available
Protection/
Mitigation
Available
High
VULNERABILITY
Resilience Low Dependence
of Process (process continues
Number of Subsectors Affected
with full disruption)
70 Total Production Processes with

by High/Very High Driver
60 High/Very High ES Dependencies
RISK
50
THREAT
Agriculture, Irrigated Crops
40
Forest Products, Forestry
30 Agriculture, Rainfed Crops
20 Agriculture, Livestock
10 Agriculture, Aquaculture
0 Utilities, Hydropower
th Ac ion
nd s
Dr ions
Se and hts
ve es
rre ter Po ise
an st ion
Ov irc tion
rv n
g
Coal Mining
Co itie
ha tio
tin
a slid
lR
ea c at
L g
nt Ab lut
d rac
er ula
es
er tiv
it
ou
W esti ific
Integrated Oil & Gas

l
EXPOSURE
Le
d
om o
C
M
Metals and Mining

r D at
Cu Wa
l o bit
Water and Utilities

ria Ha
Apparel, Natural Fibers

n
ea
st
0 5 10 15
du
Oc
In
The figure above shows how ENCORE’s data can clarify where businesses’ dependencies on nature may lead
to nature-related risk. The tool provides data on:
• Material threats (red bar chart; top 10 drivers of environmental change across all production processes)
• Sectors with high exposure to nature-related risk, based on their material dependencies (blue bar chart;
production processes with the greatest number of high/very high material dependencies)
• High vulnerability or low resilience of the production processes to disruption (yellow pie chart; most
commonly cited reasons why a process would have low vulnerability or high resilience to disruption)
17
Each of the four major types of NRR can accrue to

businesses (directly or indirectly) due to either their
4. Types of Nature-Related Risk for Business dependencies or their impacts on nature. For instance,
In addition to considering how nature-related risk regulatory and legal risks could affect a business through
emerges, it is necessary to understand the variety new regulation on the extraction of raw materials (a
of types of nature-related risks that are of concern dependency-related change) or through an improved
for business. regulatory or liability regime targeting the business’s
pollution (an impact-related change). See examples
This work directly parallels WEF’s annual Global Risk below, in Section 4.2 and Section 5.
Reports. For selecting the types of risk presented in
our typology of risks and throughout the paper, we Nature-related risk management approaches vary
conducted a frequency analysis of reports, disclosure depending on the specific risk and include operational
frameworks, and risk analysis tools. We used frequency changes (such as increased resource efficiency, input
of mention across sources as a proxy indicator for the substitution or diversification away from high-impact
expected importance and materiality of different types or high-dependency production processes) as well as
of nature-related risks across sectors. The five most traditional corporate social responsibility (CSR) and
common risk types identified from our survey were marketing strategies.
physical, regulatory & legal, market, reputational, and
4.1 Risk Type Frequencies
financial risk. Although there were discrepancies in terms
used among the sources we reviewed,e our objective As introduced above, we assessed the most commonly
in harmonization is to help facilitate corporate risk cited concerns regarding nature-related risk in order to
management in this space.f present a harmonized high-level typology on nature-
related risk, and also to highlight the risks emerging in
Physical risks arise from material destruction—such as this space.
damage to infrastructure and disruption of operations—
causing economic and financial losses for businesses Although at least 70 unique risk types, drivers of risk, and
and investors. Physical risk can be further classified consequences were identified, we included only those
into event-driven (“acute”) or longer-term in nature that appeared in two or more sources. See Annex 1 for
(“chronic”).2,10 Regulatory & legal risks relate to laws, details and full results.
policies, regulations, and court actions that affect the
The five risk types above can be further separated into
operations of businesses.9,11 Market risks “relate to
‘threats’ and ‘consequences’ by asking whether what is
product and service offerings, customer preferences,
being described as a risk pertains to a potential event/
and other market factors that can affect corporate
change or the result of that event/change. We see the
performance.”4 Reputational risks relate to a company’s
analytical value of this difference in its ability to highlight
brand, image, and relationship with customers, the
two elements of risk for businesses: 1) how a risk might
general public, and other stakeholders.9,11 In addition
arise (the threat), but also 2) how it becomes material
to the four main risk types—physical, regulatory & legal,
to the business or investors (the consequence). This is
market and reputational risk—financial risk was also
a simple distinction largely missing from the current
commonly mentioned across the sources surveyed.
conversation.
We propose a division of financial risk into financing
and financier risk to be precise about whether the risk Table 1a summarizes the most commonly cited
accrues to businesses (financing risk) or to financial nature-related threats to business, followed by Table 1b,
institutions (financier risk). We treat this risk type which summarizes the consequences of these nature-
separately given that it typically occurs as an outcome related risks.h
of the risks and may be considered most often as a
consequence (see Section 4.1).
e.
For instance, physical risk is often spoken of as “operational risk.” The key difference between physical and operational risk is the inclusion of value chains in the former. Although reviewers
expressed preference for operational risk, our frequency analysis resulted in a higher count for physical risk. Physical risk also aligns with the TCFD typology, which is quickly gaining traction
in the climate space. However, in the TCFD context, physical risks are limited to those caused by acute or chronic manifestations of climate change; the categories of specific risks we include
under physical nature-related risks are broader; see Annex 1. From this data, we note that “environmental risk” was actually the high-level type with the most hits; this was due to using this
term as the default (e.g., for ESG frameworks). Ultimately, we view environmental risk as the over-arching type to categorize both nature-related risks and climate change-related risks.
f.
See footnote c.
g.
For example, if a flood causes a power outage and damage to for a utilities company, this physical risk can lead directly to financial consequences in the form of damage costs and
potential increases in insurance premiums. This flood represents an interruption of the business’s reliance on the buffering and attenuation of water flows or water regulation (a specific
type of ES). On the other hand, if a business’s operations generate an environmental impact (e.g., through an oil spill or dam collapse—see examples below), this may become a financial
consequence to business indirectly, accruing instead through the responses of regulators, society, and the market.
h.
Notably, some risks – like litigation, compensation and damages – can fall under either category of threats or consequences, depending on the stage in the risk cycle at which they emerge.
18
Threats were split relatively evenly across the first four number of specific threats were mentioned for the
major risk types: There were 11 mentions for physical, regulatory & legal and physical risk categories; lesser
14 for regulatory & legal, 10 for market and 13 for attention to market and reputational risks may be due to
reputational risk. However, there were only 5 mentions the routine nature of risk management for these types.
for financial risk, and these were only listed as what Compared to the other types, regulatory & legal risks
could be considered consequences. may have been overlooked in the past, but the large
array of specific types identified in our review suggest
For threats, those which appeared in 25% or more
that businesses and other actors are broadening their
of the sources surveyed include litigation, damages,
scope of concern in this domain. High-level risk type
and compensation (11 mentions); acute events and
counts are included in Table 1a to communicate the
damage from hazards (11); pricing or other regulation
relatively even spread of concern across these major
of externalities (10); biodiversity loss (7); and changing
categories, despite variation in attention to the specific
consumer preferences (7). Interestingly, a greater
threats identified.
Table 1a. Top cited examples of nature-related threats across reviewed sources
RISK TYPES THREAT TYPE TOTAL
Physical Risk 11
Acute events; damage from natural/man-made hazards 11
Biodiversity loss and decreasing species richness 7
Scarcity of water 4
Availability, reliability, and security of energy 4
Habitat loss 2
Air pollution 2
Water pollution 2
Regulatory & Legal Risk 14

Litigation, damages, and/or compensation 11
Pricing or other regulations for emissions (GHG*/other) 10
Restrictions on land and ES access 6
Air pollution regulation 6
Non-hazardous waste management 6
Soil pollution regulation 6
Resource quotas for ES use 4
Unsustainable practices 4
Changing liability regimes 3
Hazardous waste management 3
Water pollution regulation 3
Changes in disclosure requirements 2
Market Risk 10
Changing consumer preferences 7
Inability to attract co-financiers due to uncertainty 2
Purchaser requirements 2
Reputational Risk 13
Negative press coverage 3
Divestment or other stakeholder campaigns 3
Impacts on World Heritage Sites or protected areas 2
Impacts on species on IUCN** Red List 2
Physical Risk Regulatory & Legal Risk Market Risk Reputational Risk
*GHG – Greenhouse gas

** IUCN – International Union for Conservation of Nature
19
Table 1b. Most cited consequences of nature-related risks across reviewed sources
RISK TYPES CONSEQUENCE TYPE TOTAL
Physical Risk Disruptions to business operations 7

Labor shortages 5
Regulatory & Legal Risk Unexpected costs of compliance/fines for noncompliance 9

Stranded assets 4
Market Risk Changes in the cost and availability of resources 4
Reputational Risk Lost sales due to negative perceptions of the institution 3
Financial Risk Increased cost of capital or lending requirements 5

Write-downs of asset value and write-offs of assets 5
Increased insurance claims 4
Higher premiums; loss of insurance value 4
Increased risk of default 3
Loss of investment value related to reputational risks 2
Changes in market value of the business 2
Physical Risk Regulatory & Legal Risk Market Risk Reputational Risk Financial Risk
For consequences, those that appeared in 25% or more e.g., those that are regulatory, financial, or reputational risks,
sources include costs and fines related to compliance (9 and which may in turn result in financial consequences.
mentions) and disruptions to business operations (7). The For example, a physical risk related to the scarcity of water
full data on this review can be found in Annex 1. Notably, may create a regulatory and/or operational risk related to
the routine management mentioned above may skew the access to that resource and to the profitability of operations
data on risks of concern: Those that are contained or are (see Case Study 3 in Section 5). If that input is not easily
not considered sufficiently material for businesses may not substitutable, a cascade of risks may pose a serious threat to
have been included by the sources we surveyed. the economic profitability of operations, resulting in financial
consequences.i
Our data indicates twice as much assessment of threats
(Table 1a) than of consequences (Table 1b), and that Nature-related risks may also arise through multiple
consequences on average receive slightly more attention pathways: The physical risk of ecosystem degradation
per specific type than threats. Greater variety in the may become a risk to companies as a consequence of
number of threats being mentioned correlates with the new regulations coming into place requiring companies to
need of businesses to assess the full array of potential restore the land they have used, or, due to an assessment
risks, and slightly greater weight to each consequence revealing a company’s dependence on ecosystem services.
may correlate with their direct connection to financial Ecosystem degradation may also be a threat to reduced
materiality. output and productivity for the company. Some specific
threat-consequence pathways were identified across
4.2 Connecting Threats and Consequences sources, including regulatory risk leading to increased
As acknowledged by many others, the five high-level risk compliance costs and physical risk leading to disruption
types (physical, regulatory & legal, market, reputational, of operations. Future work elaborating these connections
and financial) are not mutually exclusive. Instead, they may can improve the understanding of nature-related risks
feed one another.11 In many cases, physical risks may be within the corporate risk management community.
precursors or bring the threat of other nature-related risks,
i.
Notably, these cascading risks and consequences may be felt by one business, or may also be passed vertically–along a supply chain, or horizontally—throughout an industry.
20
The proposed typology of nature-related risks—physical, economic, social, and governmental factors across scales of
regulatory & legal, market, reputational, and financial— economic activity that put their operations and profits at risk.
can help organize corporate risk analysis within the They should remain cognizant of the ever-changing context
framework of nature-related risk consisting of change, in which risk unfolds; the prevalence of different risks can
threat, exposure, vulnerability, and consequence. See Table be expected to change over time. Should scientific evidence
2 on the following page to understand how the framework and policymaking keep pace, a broader subset of ecological
and typology come together. transition risks could begin unfolding once a global target
is set on ecosystem service protection or natural capital
Ultimately, risk managers must think about the connections
maintenance, having threats and consequences that can
among these elements of risk, their drivers, and the other
ripple throughout supply chains and networks of trade.
21
Table 2. Major types of nature-related risks, including how each maps to the risk framework through threat,
exposure, vulnerability, consequence, and management approaches
PHYSICAL RISK REGULATORY & LEGAL RISK

Dependency on Nature Impact on Nature Dependency on Nature Impact on Nature
Change: Drought Change: Infrastructure failure Change: New regulation on Change: New liability regime
natural resource extraction limits
Threat: Water shortage Threat: Contamination of Threat: Higher levels of
surrounding watershed Threat: Lack of access to inputs enforcement; liability for
Exposure: Water intensity of
environmental contamination
business; value chain geography; Exposure: Characteristics of area Exposure: Sector; geography
natural variability of operation – e.g., biodiversity, of production assets Exposure: Pollutive production
indigenous communities processes, jurisdiction of
Vulnerability: Production Vulnerability: Production
operation
process resilience to Vulnerability: Risk management process flexibility
disruption; alternative water practices; reputation of company Vulnerability: Previous record;
Financial Consequence:
sources; concentration of and industry; cash on hand expendable capital; legal
Input costs rise
operations in exposed area expertise
Financial Consequence:
Nature-related Risk
Financial Consequence: Legal costs, operations stalled Financial Consequence:
Management Approaches:
Production process disrupted (forgone sales), market value Legal suit for environmental
Lobbying; research and
operations impacted of company at risk contamination increased legal
development on substitutes;
costs, higher cost of capital
Nature-Related Risk Nature-related Risk relocation
Management Approaches: Management Approaches: Nature-related Risk
Improve water efficiency; Engage in remediation; Management Approaches:
collaborative water conservation payments to affected Compliance; stakeholder
with surrounding communities communities; CSR and engagement
stakeholder engagement;
compliance with
regulation/penalties
MARKET RISK REPUTATIONAL RISK

Dependency on Nature Impact on Nature Dependency on Nature Impact on Nature
Change: Resource scarcity (from Change: Increasing Change: Growing social Change: Media investigation
depletion or new regulations) environmental awareness awareness around risks of company’s operations
presented by industry
Threat: Increased price of goods Threat: Change in consumer Threat: Protests
preferences toward low-impact Threat: Loss of social license
Exposure: Source markets; Exposure: Environmental
goods to operate
degree of reliance on scarce awareness in home and host
goods; availability of alternatives Exposure: Sales markets Exposure: Environmental country; production processes
awareness in home and host
Vulnerability: Production Vulnerability: Brand value; Vulnerability: Risk management
country; production processes
process flexibility competition practices; reputation of company
Vulnerability: Risk management and industry; relations with
Financial Consequence: Financial Consequence: practices; reputation of company stakeholders; size of company;
Higher input costs Change in consumer preferences and industry; relations with proximity of investors/sharehold-
decreased sales stakeholders
Nature-related Risk ers to protestors
Management Approaches: Nature-related Risk Financial Consequence: Financial Consequence:
Advertising; CSR activities Management Approaches: Loss of social license to operate Boycotts and protests
Engage in remediation; operations affected decreased sales
payments to affected
communities; CSR and Nature-related Risk Nature-related Risk
stakeholder engagement; Management Approaches: Management Approaches:
compliance with Stakeholder engagement; Stakeholder engagement;
regulation/penalties press releases press releases
22
framework and typology are bolded to highlight how

these emerge in context. As part of this work, we have
5. Case Studies of Nature-Related Risk also compiled a selection of illustrative nature-related
to Business risk case studies, available here.
Case studies clarify how nature-related risks become Note that the cases below only represent a portion of
material for business. Below we present examples the risks experienced by businesses, many of which go
using the framework and terminology introduced in undisclosed. For the most part, other case studies focus
the sections above. on positive actions by business to manage and reduce
risk. This approach helps to boost corporate value
To reiterate, nature-related risk results from a change rather than raise flags for shareholders, investors, and
in an organization’s impacts and/or dependencies on auditors. In comparison to other cases, the cases below
nature. A nature-related risk becomes consequential focus on disastrous events that clearly signal corporate
to business only if it is sufficiently exposed, vulnerable, failure to manage risks.
and has an insufficient response to the change or threat
driving that risk. Below, we summarize each of the cases within the
framework of nature-related risk. Note that listed
The case studies below show the connections between elements of vulnerability and exposure can have either
types of risk and the messiness of these in the real a positive or a negative effect on the consequences
world. We include cases that are emblematic instances incurred by the company (Table 3).
in which an actual risk event occurred. Elements of the
Table 3. Selected case studies of nature-related risk and consequences for companies
BUSINESS CHANGE IN DEPENDENCIES THREAT VULNERABILITY EXPOSURE CONSEQUENCE(S)

OR IMPACTS
BP Impacts of the oil spill Damage to Risk assessment (-); Types of activities Legal costs at around
surrounding brand value (+) undertaken (e.g., USD 62.59–144.89 billion;
environment deepwater drilling); loss of USD 3.7 billion in
operations in marine revenue; drop in market
environment cap and share prices;
increased insurance rates
across the industry
Vale Growing awareness about Collapse of the Risk assessment (-); Environmental Suspension of operations;
the dangers of “upstream” tailings dam brand reputation (-) conditions USD 2.3 billion
tailings dams in assets frozen;
employees arrested;
drops in share value
and bond prices; down-
graded credit ratings
German Depletion of South African Crop failures Diversification of Distance from primary EUR 70 million in
exporters water sources; drought suppliers and diversified production; geography forgone sales/profits
products (+) of supply chain;
sociopolitical mood in
home and host countries
PG&E Increased dryness in Sparks on the Risk assessment (-) Types of activities under- Over USD 30 billion in
the environment; power lines taken (e.g., power trans- liabilities; bankruptcy
malfunctioning mission); environmental
equipment conditions of operation
23
5.1 Case Study 1: BP Oil Spill burned for 36 hours, and sank. Eleven workers died,
and over 200 million gallons of oil gushed into the
Gulf of Mexico.
As the largest oil spill in US history, the incident led to

consequences which accrued not just to BP, but also
to communities along over 1,100 miles of impacted
coastline and to economies dependent on the 68,000
square miles of contaminated water. For the local
tourism industry, the spill also imparted financial
Photo: WikiCommons. Public Domain.
consequences to the tune of some USD 22.7 billion in
lost revenue by 2013. By 2020, the local fishing industry
The damage to BP’s reputation and market share as a is expected to have lost USD 8.7 billion in revenue and
result of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill shows how a 22,000 jobs. This example shows how the threat of NRR
company’s negative impact on nature can cause socio- generated by one company can become consequences
economic harm, eventually translating into risk to the for others.
company’s bottom line (i.e. financial consequences).
BP suffered most from the regulatory & legal risk that
Leading up to the Deepwater Horizon spill, BP’s US arose out of the spill’s macro-level impacts. Claims are
refineries had 760 “egregious and willful” safety still rolling in, but recent estimates show BP’s ultimate
violations from the Occupational Safety & Health fine from society in the USD 62.59-144.89 billion range.
Administration, compared to 19 such violations for
BP also faced profound financing consequences,
all other US oil operators combined. A culture of
posting a loss of USD 3.7 billion in 2010, down from
prioritizing profits over safety made BP especially
a USD 16.6 billion profit the prior year. Market cap
vulnerable to the threat of an environmental incident.
plummeted by half after the spill, and share prices
When this threat came as an oil spill in April 2010,
never recovered to pre-spill levels. After BP’s spill,
it became a physical risk—due primarily to the
insurance companies raised premiums on deepwater
vulnerabilities posed by poor management and the
drilling to alleviate financier risk even as oil companies
exposures entailed in marine oil drilling—as BP’s
ramped up demand for coverage, ballooning insurance
Deepwater Horizon rig in the Macondo well exploded,
costs industry-wide to over 100%.
Figure 5. High-level framework illustrating nature-related risk to BP
DEPENDENCY-RELATED CHANGE
N/A
DEPENDENCIES
ON NATURE
VULNERABILITY
RISK MANAGEMENT
PRACTICES; BRAND VALUE
MACRO:
MICRO: BUSINESS ECONOMY
THREAT NATURE- CONSEQUENCE INSURERS;
ENVIRONMENTAL
RELATED LEGAL COSTS, LOSS OF REVENUE,
BP OIL AND GAS
INCIDENT RISK DROP IN SHARE PRICES INDUSTRY;
NATURE MACRO-
EXPOSURE ECONOMY
TYPE OF ACTIVITIES
UNDERTAKEN;
ENVIRONMENTAL
CONTEXT OF OPERATIONS
IMPACT-RELATED CHANGE IMPACTS

OIL SPILL ON NATURE
24
5.2 Case Study 2: Collapse of Vale’s Further market and financial consequences have
Brumadinho Dam followed: Within weeks of the disaster, the company
suffered the largest single-day loss in the history of the
In January 2019, over 200 people were killed, 270
Brazilian stock market,51 falling by USD 19 billion on
hectares of land were destroyed, and 300 km of rivers
Brazil’s B3 stock exchange. Further consequences
were impacted by the largest environmental disaster
include drops in Vale’s bond prices and downgrades in its
in Brazilian history. The collapse of Vale’s Brumadinho
credit ratings from both Fitch and Standard & Poor.51
tailings dam at Córrego de Feijão mine released toxic
mudflow into native vegetation and protected forests, Beyond the company, consequences are ricocheting
as well as into rivers where the waste—composed among investors and others involved in Brazil’s metal
of metals and chemicals—can last for decades.46 In and mining sector. There are emerging concerns about
addition to ecosystem and species disturbances, the security of a nearby mine, also operated by Vale; the
this can have a critical impact on the well-being of risks of the Brumadinho disaster remain present for the
thousands of Brazilians living near the disaster: The company, investors, regulators, and local communities.52
contaminated Sao Francisco river is a source of drinking
Risky practices are coming under closer scrutiny,
water for hundreds of municipalities.47
with expected financial consequences to follow. In
For Vale, the mining company operating the faulty addition to a new ban on new ‘upstream’ tailings dams
dam, the consequences of the physical risk posed by and requirement for decommissioning all those in
its collapse are still playing out. Key consequences to operation by 2021, there are expected adjustments to
date include the suspension of Vale’s operations at national laws regarding external auditors and auditing.
several mines (due to its responsibility for both the 2019 The failings in Brazil have raised an alarm globally—a
Brumadinho disaster and the 2015 disaster at Samarco demand for disclosure emerged from global investors
Mineracao);48 the freezing of USD 2.3 billion of its assets (including the Bank of England and Swedish pension
under a court order;49 and the arrest of a handful of funds)53 in April. This group—managing USD 10.3 trillion
employees, including executives, on suspicion of murder in assets—demanded that 683 mining companies,
after being found aware of significant safety problems.50 including Vale, provide details of every tailings dam
Other executives have since resigned in the wake of under their control. More stringent regulations could
legal, regulatory, and reputational consequences. impose greater financial burdens on this industry.
Photo: CC BY-SA 2.0

25
5.3 Case Study 3: German exporters in Relying on South Africa and other water-scarce nations,
South Africa German food exporters, distributors, and retailers are
at risk of threats related to their water dependence,
Agricultural producers directly depend on access to
passed along supply chains, and potentially leading
water resources (quality and quantity) and associated
to consequences in terms of the availability and
ecosystem services like water regulation. Changes in
price of goods (in other words, market and financial
the supply of these inputs can lead to cascading risks
consequences); they are also at risk of threats
throughout the food sector. In this case, we attend to
related to their water impacts linked to their use of
the different risks accrued to farmers in South Africa
agrochemicals, overfertilization, and salinization of soil.
verses the German exporters and retailers further down
Each of these threats can further lead to reputational
the supply chain.
threats.
Since 2017, the drought in South Africa has resulted
To date, German retailers and exporters have been
in economic losses of over USD 510 million to farmers
dealt a lesser blow by the drought—in comparison to
alone.54 Food exporters (buyers for overseas clients)
their South African suppliers—given the diversification
have lost at least USD 75 million from crop failures of
of their supply chains. This factor of reduced
high-priced items like wine and fruit. Outside the export
vulnerability may become overwhelmed by changes
sector, staple crops like maize have gone up in price and
in the sociopolitical mood of both their home and host
down in supply. High food prices and food insecurity
country if societal woes in South Africa continue to grow
will increase the amount of food South Africa needs to
(increasing retailers’ exposure). Already, the physical
import from overseas. These financial consequences,
risks experienced by the food sector are creating water
accumulated at various levels of the economic activity,
shortages which may result in restrictions on access or
through farmers to financiers and up to the state, are
loss of social license to operate for some companies
a massive setback to the country’s economy and to its
(otherwise understood as regulatory risk). If the quality
development goals.
of farmland continues to degrade, it may also become
In Germany, food and beverage retailers have financially devalued, posing a financing risk to asset
been cited as “importing water risk” through their holders who may be left with temporarily illiquid assets.
supply chains.55
Photo: By Zaian. CC BY-SA 4.0

26
5.4 Case Study 4: PG&E Bankruptcy 5.5 Case Study Summary

Case Studies 1, 2, and 4 are emblematic of businesses
ignoring nature-related risk. Although in each case the
companies were aware (at some level) of the risks, they
were not compelled to take action to reduce or manage
threats. This self-assessment of vulnerability (or lack
thereof) is in part what allowed these risks to materialize
with significant consequences. These examples also
show how physical risk generated by a company might
not translate directly into consequences for business
operations; instead, the consequences of risk need
recognition from society, markets, and regulators in
Photo: CC BY-SA 2.0 order to create consequences for the business.
Case Study 3, on German exporters in South Africa,

The events surrounding Pacific Gas & Electric Company’s
differs from the rest in a number of ways. It illustrates
(PG&E) 2019 bankruptcy56 illustrate how climate change
how risks are spread over supply chains (with differential
translates into risk through business operations, as well
risk exposure for each actor) and trade relationships
as how risk feeds back into legal, market, and natural
between countries, showing how the consumers of goods
systems to perpetuate additional risks.
in one country can create or ameliorate dependency-
In recent years, PG&E repeatedly neglected to related risks in other countries. This case also exemplifies
maintain faulty equipment prone to sparks, creating how risks to companies can emerge from changes in
vulnerability for itself through haphazard risk their dependencies, whereas the other cases exemplify
management practices. This vulnerability was how risks can emerge from changes in their impacts.
exacerbated by dry conditions in the company’s Finally, Case Study 3 is an example of how changes in the
service area due to anthropogenic climate change. The climate can intersect with human patterns of resource
exposure of PG&E to the physical risk of fire arose from use. Although the El Niño event that has been linked to
its operations: transmitting energy in a fire-sensitive the drought is a relatively standard pattern, drought is
landscape. Ultimately, these factors of negligence and expected to intensify, creating dependency-related risks
environmental context resulted in homes and lives for water-reliant businesses operating in South Africa
consumed by fire across hundreds of thousands of and other semi-arid regions. When compounded with
acres in Northern California. impact-related risks linked to nature degradation, the
consequences may become more severe.
Though society bore much of the consequence of this
physical risk, it eventually translated into financial
consequence to the business in early 2019 when PG&E
faced over USD 30 billion in liabilities and filed for
Chapter 11 bankruptcy in January.
PG&E was not the only affected company, however, as

its bankruptcy proceedings cleared the path for PG&E
to relieve itself of over USD 42 billion in power-purchase
agreements (PPAs), and renewable energy providers
then found that they suddenly faced market risk if
PG&E’s bankruptcy were to lead it to rewrite power
contracts at lower prices. In the face of this impending
change and uncertainty, renewable energy growth
has slowed, stunting the transition away from fossil
fuels and continuing the increase of greenhouse gas
emissions. Ironically, these outcomes exacerbate the
exposure of society and other businesses to these risks
and others associated with a changing climate, like
landslides, fire, and drought.
27
2. T
he following are opportunities for businesses in
addressing NRR highlighted by Finance Watch, TCFD,
6. Opportunities and Future Work and the Natural Capital Coalition, among others:
This report offers a consolidated framework for
• Resource efficiency – Real-time decreases in costs
understanding nature-related risk, reviews types of
can come from improvements in material efficiency,
nature-related risk from existing literature and offers
and in the future cost reductions may arise from the
case studies on company consequences of nature-
sustainable use of resources.
related risk. With this final section, we seek to highlight 1)
needs for future research and 2) opportunities available • Product, service and market opportunities –
in addressing nature-related risk. Companies can gain first-entrant advantage in
nature-friendly markets for products and services and
1. Future research have the ability to develop brand value in this space.
• Further incorporating ideas from climate-related risk To replace carbon- and nature-intensive assets,
management to nature-related risk, and vice versa, innovation will be necessary.
building on TCFD’s climate risk work to increase • Financing opportunities – By conducting nature-
businesses knowledge of nature-related risk. related impact and dependency assessments,
Critically, more work is needed on understanding businesses can demonstrate their understanding
the potential synergies that can be attained when and management of nature-related risks, allowing
businesses and other actors tackle climate change them to improve their credit ratings and access funds
and nature loss in unison. which are targeted toward ‘impact,’ ‘responsible’ and
• Additional study on the connection between macro- ‘green’ investment. These self-assessments are key in
level and micro-level nature-related risk is needed. a context of improved green investment classification
Understanding how macroeconomic risk and schemes (e.g., ongoing work within the European
microeconomic risk feed into one another at different Commission).57
spatial and temporal scales is a critical question for • Opportunities for collaborative action – self-
further research and action, since private-sector assessments of corporate impacts and dependencies
materiality concerns may be both short-term and on nature can feed into collective action by those
damaging to common pool resources like natural actors who are mutually reliant on the same
capital. ecosystem services or natural capital within a discrete
• New thinking and analysis are needed on the region. This elevates the ability of businesses to
potential for systemic risk to emerge, especially if manage emerging nature-related risks.
regional- or large-scale ecosystem collapse occurs. • Reputational opportunities – A strong reputation
• Collaboration between businesses, finance on nature-related risk can be associated with a
institutions, credit rating agencies, independent higher selling power and greater advantages in the
auditors and regulators is necessary to harmonize hiring process.
the frameworks through which businesses’ impacts • Leadership opportunities at the Convention
and dependencies on nature are assessed and on Biological Diversity (CBD) 2020 – Companies
disclosed. can demonstrate leadership and gain first-entrant
advantage with strong participation in addressing
Improving companies’ understanding of nature-related
common drivers of ecosystem service erosion.
risks allows them to manage those risks, and also to
capitalize on opportunities associated with proactively
addressing the loss and degradation of nature. Now is
the time for early movers to address the unprecedented
risk posed by changes in nature.
28
7. Annexes
29
Annex 1: Data on Nature-Related Risk Counts

A1. Table 1. Full Data on Types, Threats and Consequences Mentioned in Review (Section 4)
Risk Type Type, Driver, Specific Threat or Consequence Total

Threat or Consequence* Mentions
Environmental Risk Type N/A 13

Operational Risk Type N/A 6
Physical Risk Type N/A 8
Physical Risk Consequence Disruptions to business operations 7
Physical Risk Consequence Labor shortages 5
Physical Risk Driver Climate change 13
Physical Risk Driver Ecosystem degradation 12
Physical Risk Driver Invasive species 2
Physical Risk Threat Acute events; (damage from) natural or 11
man-made hazards, extreme events
Physical Risk Threat Scarcity of raw materials (quantity, quality) 9
Physical Risk Threat Biodiversity loss and decreasing species richness 7
Physical Risk Threat Reduced output or productivity of land/resources 5
Physical Risk Threat Scarcity of water 4
Physical Risk Threat Availability, reliability and security of energy 4
Physical Risk Threat Habitat loss 2
Physical Risk Threat Air pollution 2
Physical Risk Threat Water pollution 2
Physical Risk Threat Soil pollution 1
Legal & Regulatory Risk Type N/A 14
Legal & Regulatory Risk Consequence Unexpected costs of compliance & 9
fines for non-compliance
Legal & Regulatory Risk Consequence Stranded assets (as a result of changes in 4
land access, asset prices, waste generation or
other operational regulations)
Legal & Regulatory Risk Threat Litigation, damages and/or compensation 11
Legal & Regulatory Risk Threat Pricing or other regulations for carbon, 10
GHG emissions or other externalities
Legal & Regulatory Risk Threat Restrictions on land and ES access 6
Legal & Regulatory Risk Threat Air pollution regulation 6
Legal & Regulatory Risk Threat Non-hazardous waste management 6
Legal & Regulatory Risk Threat Soil pollution regulation 6
Legal & Regulatory Risk Threat Resource quotas for ES use 4
Legal & Regulatory Risk Threat Unsustainable practices 4
Legal & Regulatory Risk Threat Changing liability regimes 3
Legal & Regulatory Risk Threat Hazardous waste management 3
Legal & Regulatory Risk Threat Water pollution regulation 3
Legal & Regulatory Risk Threat Changes in disclosure requirements 2
Legal & Regulatory Risk Threat Changes in subsidy regimes 1
Legal & Regulatory Risk Threat Changes in international regulations or 1
standards of behavior
Legal & Regulatory Risk Threat Changes in labeling and certification requirements 1
Market Risk Type N/A 10
Market Risk Consequence Changes in the cost and availability of different 4
resources on the market
Market Risk Threat Changing consumer preferences 7
Market Risk Threat Increased uncertainty (about market trends, values); 2
inability to attract co-financiers due to uncertainty
Market Risk Threat Purchaser requirements 2
Reputational Risk Type N/A 13
Reputational Risk Consequence Lost sales due to negative perceptions of the institution 3
Reputational Risk Threat Damage to brand or social license to operate 7
Reputational Risk Threat Negative press coverage 3
Reputational Risk Threat Divestment or other stakeholder campaigns 3
Reputational Risk Threat Impacts on World Heritage Sites or protected areas 2
30
Annex 1: Data on Nature-Related Risk Counts continued

A1. Table 1. Full Data on Types, Threats and Consequences Mentioned in Review (Section 4)
Risk Type Type, Driver, Specific Threat or Consequence Total

Threat or Consequence* Mentions
Reputational Risk Threat Impacts on species on IUCN Red List 2

Reputational Risk Threat Protests 1
Societal Risk Type N/A 4
Sustainability Risk Type N/A 3
Transition Risk Type N/A 6
Transition Risk Threat Falling technology costs 1
Transition Risk Threat Disruptive technologies 1
Financial Risk Type N/A 5
Financial Risk Consequence Increased cost of capital or lending requirements 5
Write-downs of asset value (due to increased costs for ES, 5
irremediable contamination, increased risks of litigation or
obsolescence of equipment) and write-offs of assets (due
to difficulties in obtaining permits and licenses)
Financial Risk Consequence Increased insurance claims 4
Financial Risk Consequence Higher premiums; loss of insurance value 4
Financial Risk Consequence Increased risk of default (due to lower crop yields or 3
Financial Risk Consequence due to higher costs related to regulations on water
treatment and disposal)
Financial Risk Consequence Loss of investment value (related to reputational risks) 2
Financial Risk Consequence Changes in market value of the business 2
*’Type’ indicates and overarching risk type. ‘Driver’ indicates an upstream driver of risk. ‘Threat’ and ‘Consequence’ are used as defined in this report.
Sources surveyed: For this research, we surveyed reports, disclosure frameworks, and risk analysis tools. These included: NCFA & PWC 2018,
NCFA & UNEP-WCMC, NCC 2018, IPBES 2019, TCFD, OECD 2019, Bonner et al. 2012, Hanson et al. 2012, Finance Watch 2019, UNEP/PSI 2019, Bank
of England (Batten 2018), Schellekens & van Toor 2019, ERBD 2014, Caldecott et al. 2013, ELD Initiative 2013, GFSG 2017, Collins 2019, WWF & AXA
2019, Trucost 2013, PWC 2012, SASB Materiality Map 2018, S&P 2019, Moody’s Investors Service 2018, GRI 300 Series, CDP Forest, Climate, and Water
Questionnaires 2019, Water Risk Filter, SCRIPT, GMAP
A1. Table 2. Sectors with High Nature-related Risk, as Mentioned in Review
Sector* % of Sources** Ranking Number of Processes with VH/H Number of Processes with Other
Sector as High Risk Material ES identified in ENCORE Material ES identified in ENCORE
Food & Beverage 86% 76 85

Metals & Mining 86% 4 39
Oil & Gas 71% 5 29
Utilities 57% 16 54
Forestry 43% 25 12
Construction 43% 5 22
Transportation 43% 8 30
The numbers in the table above convey the consistent perception across the sources surveyed that these seven
sectors face a high degree of nature-related risk. Looking at the ENCORE data on these specific sectors, the number
of production processes which rely on ecosystem services are highest for Food & Beverage, Utilities and Metals &
Mining. However, those sectors with the highest number of VH/H ES dependencies (as a proportion of their overall ES
dependencies) are Forestry (67.5%), Food & Beverage (42%), Utilities (23%) and then Transportation (21%). While this
first measure is an indicator of the potential for production process disruption with changes in ecosystem services,
the second is a measure of that sector’s vulnerability to ecosystem service disruption; when ES materiality is higher,
production processes are more reliant on ES to continue normal functioning.
*Note that ENCORE uses the following sector categorizations: Consumer Staples for Food & Beverage, Materials for both Metal & Mining and
Forestry, Utilities for Utilities, Energy for Oil & Gas, Industrials (and Materials) for Construction and Consumer Discretionary for Transportation.
**Sources surveyed: Bonner et al.; Bonnet & Morozova 2018, ELD 2013, ENCORE; Moody’s Investors Service 2018; SASB Materiality Map 2018;
S&P 2019; Trucost 2013.j
j
Definitions of risk vary across the sources surveyed. Bonner et al. (2012) define high risk as most high risk materialities, whereas Bonnet &
Morozova (2018) define it as a combination of risks and mitigation.
31
Annex 2: Terminology Use

Below we elaborate on a number of key terms used in the paper to address debates and confusion surrounding
these words.
Nature and Biodiversity
This report uses the term nature-related risk, while other use environmental risk and biodiversity risk. We understand
environmental risk to be the over-arching category capturing nature-related and climate change-related risks (see
below), and biodiversity risk can be understood as a subset of nature-related risks.
The connection between nature and biodiversity has been framed in a number of different ways. For instance, within
the planetary boundaries concept58,59 and the Living Planet Index (WWF),60 biodiversity is seen as a barometer of
planetary health. Where indicators of biodiversity (such as species richness) are in decline, it follows that the wellbe-
ing of natural systems are at risk. In relation to our report’s other key concepts—natural capital (NC) and ecosystem
services (ES)—biodiversity has been defined as a fundamental component of NC, underpinning nature’s products and
services.61 Indeed, biodiversity is seen as central to the functioning of ES and ensuring the delivery of ES which are
critical to society.15,20,62 For example, healthy, biodiverse marshes and mangroves can fulfill flood protection services
to coastal businesses and communities. Because of the role of biodiversity in maintaining critical ES like food
provision and climate regulation, many have also drawn connections between this biodiversity and global goals
related to sustainable development and climate change.4,15
While this report recognizes the significance of biodiversity, it focuses on ‘nature’ in its broadest sense, including
biodiversity, natural capital, and ecosystem services.
Nature’s Contributions to People

The recent IPBES report uses a new term, nature’s contributions to people (NCP), to refers to “All the beneficial and
detrimental contributions that we obtain from and with nature.”4 This builds on previous work by the Millennium
Ecosystem Assessment (2005) on ecosystem services, as well as on IPBES’s own regional and thematic assessments.
According to the IPCC and IPBES, the two terms—nature’s contributions to people and ecosystem services—should be
seen as interchangeable rather than mutually exclusive.16
Below, we present a table of preliminary matches across the categories of NCP from IPBES (2019) and ES listed in the
MEA (2005) and in ENCORE’s database (2019). Boxes which are matched with a dash were found to have no direct
parallel in the other assessed categorization. As emphasized in the report, harmonizing this terminology is critical for
improving businesses’ ability to assess and manage nature-related risks; common language facilitates data collection
and risk communication.
A2. Table 1. Crosswalk of NCP and ES Categories MEA 2005, IPBES 2019, ENCORE 2019
MEA (2005) IPBES (2019) ENCORE (2019)
ES1 Food NCP 12 Food and feed ES7 Fibers and other materials
ES2 Fresh water NCP 6 Regulation of freshwater quantity, location and timing ES11 Ground water
ES18 Surface water
ES3 Fuelwood NCP 11 Energy ES1 Animal-based energy
- - NCP 3 Regulation of air quality ES5 Dilution by atmosphere and ecosystems
- - - - ES19 Ventilation
ES4 Fiber NCP 13 Materials, companionship and labor ES7 Fibers and other materials
ES5 Biochemicals NCP 14 Medicinal, biochemical and genetic resources ES10 Genetic materials
ES6 Genetic resources
ES7 Climate regulation NCP 4 Regulation of climate ES4 Climate regulation
NCP 9 Regulation of hazards and extreme events ES13 Mass stabilization and erosion control
- - - ES14 Mediation of sensory impacts
ES8 Disease regulation NCP 10 Regulation of detrimental organisms and biological processes ES2 Bio-remediation
ES6 Disease control
ES15 Pest control
ES9 Water regulation NCP 7 Regulation of freshwater and coastal water quality ES3 Buffering and attenuation of mass flows
ES9 Flood and storm protection
ES20 Water flow maintenance
ES21 Water quality
32
Annex 2: Terminology Use continued

A2. Table 1. Crosswalk of NCP and ES Categories (MEA 2005, IPBES 2019, ENCORE 2019) continued
MEA (2005) IPBES (2019) ENCORE (2019)
ES10 Water purification - - ES8 Filtration

- - NCP 5 Regulation of ocean acidification - -
ES11 Pollination NCP 2 Pollination and dispersal of seeds and other propagules ES16 Pollination
ES12 Spiritual and NCP 17 Supporting identities - -
religious - -
ES17 Sense of place NCP 17 Supporting identities - -
ES18 Cultural Heritage NCP 17 Supporting identities - -
ES13 Recreation and NCP 16 Physical and psychological experiences - -
ecotourism
ES14 Aesthetic NCP 16 Physical and psychological experiences - -
ES15 Inspirational NCP 15 Learning and inspiration - -
ES16 Educational NCP 15 Learning and inspiration - -
- - NCP 1 Habitat creation and maintenance ES12 Maintain nursery habitats
ES19 Soil formation NCP 8 Formation, protection and decontamination of soils and sediments ES17 Soil quality
ES20 Nutrient cycling - - - -
ES21 Primary production - - - -
- NCP 18 Maintenance of options - -
Value
Value is another commonly used and important term to clarify for nature-related risk. According to IPBES, “beyond
monetary worth, value conveys the relative importance or usefulness of natural capital to others.”15 Value is always
defined in the context of a given worldview and cultural context and can refer to a preference someone has for a
particular state of the world, the importance of something for itself or for others, or simply a measure.63 This reflects
what it means to ‘value’ something and hints at the diversity of values: e.g. bequest value, non-use value, monetary
value, option value. Therefore, although many have advocated for modelling the benefits/value of nature, notorious
characteristics of the task have limited progress to date (e.g., availability of data, diversity of nature’s uses, complexity
of both nature and value, and the scientific limitations of measurement). This has left some elements of NC/ES
‘model-able’ and others not (such as ground and surface water versus bioremediation or pest control). Ultimately, the
inability to capture the full picture renders efforts at valuing nature incomplete.
Dependencies versus Impacts
Framing of risks and business relationships to the environment in terms of dependencies and impacts is relatively
widespread. For instance, it can be found in the work of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Develop-
ment,15 Finance Watch,10 the Natural Capital Finance Alliance,7,64 the Biodiversity Consultancy,65 the Natural Capital
Coalition,9 the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants,22 and in the work of the World Resources Institute.11
Widespread uptake may be in part linked to strong overlaps with the otherwise widely recognized ‘input-output’ and
‘source-sink’ understandings of the economy’s relationship to nature and of nature’s contributions to welfare. The
high value contribution of the framework is maintaining a focus on business dependencies on nature, without which
some businesses could not function (e.g. the paper industry without water). If dependencies are not included, the
conversation around businesses and environmental risks tends to focus on businesses’ impacts on the environment
(e.g. the focus of the ESG community on pollution, regulatory and reputational risks).
This framing requires balancing scales of analysis. Society and the macroeconomy have dependencies and impacts
on nature as much as individual businesses do. These dependencies may be through their consumptive demands on
businesses, or through their own extractive and pollutive activities. Businesses must consider in their risk analysis
who or what may be leading to changes in the ecosystem services or natural capital stocks on the business depends
or may be held accountable for impacting.
33

Climate Change-Related Risk versus. Nature-Related Risk
Although the lines between climate change-related risk and nature-related risk are still being drawn, this report holds
them as analytically distinct in order to further understanding of nature-related risk as another category of significant
environmental risk, alongside climate change-related risk. As stated in the presentation of our framework (see Section 2
above), the terms we use for describing nature-related risk—change, threat, exposure, vulnerability and consequence—
are drawn from the literature on climate change-related risk, particularly, the work of the IPCC.
There are several overlaps between the climate and nature-related risk. Connections include the loss of nature as a driv-
er of climate change (e.g. deforestation and land conversion releasing greenhouse gases into the atmosphere) on the
one hand, and climate change as a driver of loss/degradation on the other (e.g. warmer oceans leading to the bleaching
of coral reefs).4 Conversely, a healthy environment may improve societal resilience in the face of climate change, with
the latest IPCC report on climate change and land emphasizing conservation and restoration as positive courses of
action for adaptation and mitigation. As outlined in the case studies in this report, changes in the global climate – for in-
stance increased desertification and dryness in semi-arid regions – can lead to disruption in the provision of ecosystem
services that businesses rely on (e.g. water availability) and create new risks to operations (e.g. flammability).
Materiality and Externalities

Materiality and externality are the focal points of many discussions of nature-related and climate change-related
risk. Even across the third-party agencies which monitor and report on business activities, definitions of corporate
or financial materiality diverge. There are three primary issues separating corporate definitions of materiality:
1) timeframe, 2) scope of issues, and 3) stakeholders covered in assessments and reports.66 As the Corporate
Reporting Dialogue emphasizes in its work,12 the context of corporate activities is decisive for considerations of
materiality. Therefore, sociopolitical and environmental changes can come to bear on corporate reporting practices.
The issue of timeframe related to materiality was best reflected by Mark Carney’s pivotal speech proclaiming that
climate change is the “tragedy of the horizon.”67 Carney explained that the costs of climate change will fall on future
generations because the current generation has no direct incentive to bear these costs themselves. Beyond climate
change, this analogy extends to nature loss and degradation, which is a similarly on a longer timeframe than busi-
nesses often plan for. In part because business operate on a shorter time horizon than climate change and nature
loss, businesses don’t fully consider their dependencies, impacts and consequences. However, given that materiality
is rooted in context—what is material in one context may be immaterial in another.12 As contexts change, the thresh-
old of materiality will shift and risks which were initially considered immaterial may demand greater attention.
Although businesses are the focus of this report, the actors involved in managing nature-related risk include inves-
tors, insurers, state banks, and government regulators. These actors are concerned with a wider suite of potential
risks beyond the risks of concern to businesses. Some of these concerns which may in fact derive from businesses’
operations in the form of externalities, and some of which may extend beyond businesses’ scope of financial materi-
ality.k Differences in mandates between businesses and society yield different agendas of action.
For socially oriented actors, issues of concern may include those which are ‘environmentally material.’ Environmen-
tally material issues are those involving environmental impacts or dependencies on nature which are thought to have
the potential to alter decisions being taken by businesses.21 More specifically, NCFA defines materiality as pertaining
to the importance of an ecosystem service to a business’s production process, considering two main aspects: loss
of functionality (in the case of ecosystem service disruption) and financial loss (due to that loss of functionality).7
For businesses and other actors, considering and disclosing issues with environmental materiality depends on consid-
erations like the mandatory and voluntary codes of conduct to which a business subscribes, and their mission state-
ment and principles. For businesses operating within the European Union, disclosure was influenced by the European
Commission’s 2017 Non-Binding Guidelines on Non-Financial Reporting, under which businesses must account for
the impact of their activities when assessing the materiality of non-financial information. A communication from the
Commission states that this “in effect” establishes a “double materiality” perspective, such that businesses should
disclose information which is both financially material in the classic sense, i.e. potentially consequential for the value
of the company, and also information which is environmentally and socially material.68
k.
Financial materiality refers to aspects that influence the revenue generation, costs, capital efficiency or risks that a company faces today or in
the future. Financially material issues will affect the value of the company’s equity or borrowings.
34

This extension of materiality and corporate accounting is a direct result of an increase in attention to climate and
other environmental issues from both investors and society at large.
Although a number of corporations do still report solely on issues which are financially material, the growing number
of those engaging in CSR and ESG reporting indicates that firms are beginning to acknowledge their impacts—positive
and negative—on issues of social and environmental materiality to society at large. Most companies now acknowl-
edge ESG issues in their reports69 and CEOs repeatedly rank nature-related risks at the top of their concerns.3,70–73
Conservation finance and sustainable and responsible investing are growing, and are expected to continue growing.10
The relationship of governments, consumers, financiers, and other actors to nature shapes the incentives to which
businesses respond; changes in preferences and values within these groups can create risks and pressures on busi-
nesses to act. For instance, whether or not corporate actors disclose and manage nature- and climate change-related
risks, credit rating agencies and other third-party actors can still release information on businesses and sectors, which
may have material impacts on their ability to access loans or attract financing.
The question of materiality parallels discussions on externalities. Externalities such as air pollution can impose health
burdens on communities near and far from a company’s operations. When compounded by the effects of other
polluters, these impacts become severe enough to result in decreased productivity of laborers or even labor short-
ages. This secondary effect may be felt more distantly in the economy or market in which a corporation operates, or
even within its own labor supply.74 For institutional investors, economy and market-wide impacts of externalities are
a major concern. When they are examined, negative externalities may (partially) offset the benefits associated with
production, and are often seen to erode profits across a standard portfolio (i.e., of a universal investor).75 The
inability of balance sheets and market prices to capture the environmental costs paid by society at large is a well-
known a market failure. When businesses fail to fully internalize the negative impacts of their operations, trillions of
dollars’ worth of environmental benefit are lost.19 Troublingly, prior studies have found that no high impact sector
studied was currently generating sufficient profit to cover their environmental impacts.19 Externalities are not only of
concern for citizens who rely on unpriced ecosystem services for services like climate regulation, potable water and
recreational benefits, but also for their governments, institutional investors and companies generating these costs
themselves. For governments, the cost felt by citizens is tied to their subsidy policies. Hundreds of millions of dollars
in government subsidies fuel potentially harmful agriculture and other pollutive industries.10 For universal investors
managing a wide portfolio of companies, the failure of markets and balance sheets to capture externalities can
cause residual negative impacts across their investments.75 For companies generating the costs, externalities may
eventually become financial risks should regulatory, market and/or social forces require internalization of these costs
in the future.
35
Annex 3: Literature Summary

More details available here.
Title/Link Author/Group Year Brief Nature or Intended Risk Framework

summary Climate Risk Audience Used
A Call for Action: NGFS (Network for 2019 Network for Greening the Financial System presents a climate central banks; physical and
Climate change Greening the Financial set of recommendation for integrating climate change policymakers transition risks
as a source of System) risks into financial systems. Among these is disclosing
financial risk in line with TCFD and developing a taxonomy of
economic activities.
Biodiversity: Finance OECD 2019 OECD report linking biodiversity loss to socio- nature G7 ecological, liability,
and the economic economic and business concerns. Prepared for the G7 Environment regulatory,
and business case Environment Ministers’ Meeting, 5-6 May 2019 ministers; reputational,
for action framing for market, financial
CBD 2020
Global assessment IPBES Diaz, Settle, & 2019 Global assessment based on existing academic nature policymakers NA
report on Brondizio literature on biodiversity and ecosystems services
biodiversity and
ecosystem services
Into the wild: AXA and WWF-France 2019 Report summarizing risks to the finance sector due nature G7 operational, legal &
Integrating nature to loss of nature; focused on laying out categories Environment regulatory, markets,
into investment of risks, and possible approaches to risk report and ministers; reputational,
strategies assessment. Section 2.3 lays out opportunities to be finance societal
had in facing risks. institutions
Making finance serve Finance Watch 2019 proposes moving away from finance that ignores nature policymakers references multiple
nature (Ludovic Suttor-Sorel) nature to finance that supports nature, including frameworks,
accounting of natural capital; risks and opportunities; primarily TCFD for
and supportive of ‘mission-oriented’ finance risk framework
Underwriting UNEP & PRI 2019 Byline: The first ESG guide for the global insurance nature insurance ESG -->
environmental, social industry developed by UN Environment’s Principles for industry environment
and governance risks Sustainable Insurance Initiative.
in non-life insurance
business
Values at risk? Schellekens & van Toor 2019 Bank-produced report identifying and addressing nature finance water risk,
Sustainability risks management of ‘environmental and social risks’ related institutions biodiversity risk,
and goals in the to water, biodiversity, resource loss, and human rights resource scarcity
Dutch financial risk
sector
Measuring Allianz 2018 analysis of 7 natural capital risks that businesses face, nature businesses Sectors are
and managing across 12 sectors. Data from literature review, MSCI, categorized as high,
environmental and interviews. medium, or low
exposure: A business risk. Risk process
sector analysis of is elaborated in 3
natural capital risk steps: awareness,
preparation, and
management
Aiming higher to Mace et al. 2018 Frame-setting Nature Sustainability comment paper nature academics NA
bend the curve of calling for new a new goal, targets, and metrics to
biodiversity loss restore biodiversity. Linked to larger New Deal for
Nature and People.
Climate change and Bank of England 2018 outlines “key theoretical and empirical modelling issues climate economists, physical risk and
the macro-economy: (Batten, Sandra) in the analysis of the macroeconomic risks deriving central banks transition risk;
a critical review from climate change” and discusses the increasing unpredictable
need to quantify climate risks shocks versus
predictable long-
term impacts
Climate change Campiglio, Dafermos, 2018 Argument for the need for developing a framework climate researchers, calling for
challenges for Monnin, Ryna-Collins, to assess the impact of climate change on financial banks development of a
central banks and Schotten & Tanaka stability and to incorporate such assessment into framework
financial regulators regulation and policy dependencies and
impacts;
Connecting finance Natural Capital 2018 Focused on ways to assess the finance sector’s impacts nature ESG analysts, operational, legal &
and natural capital: Coalition & Natural and dependencies on natural capital regulatory, markets,
A supplement to Capital Finance (1 of 3 interrelated reports) reputational,
the natural capital Alliance societal
protocol
36
Annex 3: Literature Summary continued

Exploring natural Natural Capital Finance 2018 Report focused on detailing the ENCORE tool nature finance dependencies and
capital opportunities, Alliance and UN (Natural Capital Finance Alliance, 2019) institutions impacts (species,
risks and exposure: Environment WCMC (2 of 3 interrelated reports) water, disease,
A practical guide for drought, fire, etc)
financial institutions
Global Risks 2018: World Economic 2018 Annual report on global risks: cites loss of biodiversity nature businesses rating
Fractures, fears and Forum and climate change risks to private sector
failures Annual assessment of 20+ global risks, not exclusive to
climate change, but ranking climate change high
Integrating natural Natural Capital 2018 Brief report framing assessing risk of natural capital nature finance dependencies and
capital in risk Finance Alliance & loss or impairment for banks. Examples are at the scale institutions impacts;
assessments: A Pricewaterhouse of a sector/industry within a country (3 of 3 interrelated risks are credit,
step-by-step guide Coopers reports) environmental,
for banks market,
reputational,
operational,
compliance, liquidity
Making Waves: UNEP Inquiry (Zadeck 2018 Part of the broader UNEP FI ‘Inquiry’ on sustainable nature policymakers discusses risk,
Aligning the and Robins) finance which makes the case for “aligning the financial but not specially
financial system system with sustainable development” focused on
with sustainable identifying risk types
development
S&P Global Ratings’ S&P 2018 Separate from credit ratings, these are entity-specific nature businesses, all ESG, not specific
Proposal for evaluations, based on a “cross-sector, relative analysis FIs to environment/
Environmental, of an entity’s ability to operate successfully in the nature only
Social, And future and optimize long-term stakeholder value in
Governance (ESG) light of its natural and social environment and the
Evaluations quality of its governance.”
Stranded Assets and Caldecott, Ben 2018 “edited collection [which] provides a comprehensive nature researchers stranded assets
the Environment assessment of stranded assets and the environment” as a framing for
environmental risks
The private sector’s Goldstein, Turner, 2018 Review of corporate adaptation strategies indicates climate researchers NA; review of risk
climate change risk Gladstone, & Hole that risks of climate change should be better assessed approaches
and adaptation blind and incorporated
spots
Environmental Risks Moody’s 2018 Rating of the level of environmental risks (high/med/ nature investors risk level: high/
Global Heatmap low) across five environmental risks (air pollution, med/low
Overview soil/water, carbon regulation, water shortage, natural risk timeframe:
hazards) and across many sectors (eg: shipping, power immediate v.
generation, agriculture), including the value of the emerging
current debt holdings for that sector 5 environment
categories: air
pollution, soil/
water, carbon
regulation, etc
Advancing TCFD Four Twenty Seven 2018 focused on climate risk, following TCFD work; “lay the climate regulators building on TCFD
guidance on physical and Acclimatise for foundations for a common conceptual framework and
climate risks and EBRD a standard set of metrics for reporting physical climate
opportunities risks and opportunities”
Enhancing Green Finance Study 2017 i) Understanding practice via case studies; ii) nature public Environmental
environmental Group [GFSG] Categorizing existing ERA practices; iii) A desk review institutions risk factors (e.g.
risk assessment in evaluation of effectiveness through case analysis; Physical, transition
financial decision- iv) Identifying barriers to effective usage of ERA risk) and Financial
making methodologies; and v) developing options to promote Risks (Business,
wider adoption of ERA practices Legal, Market,
Credit). See diagram
of this on page 10
Implementing the TCFD 2017 Practical implementation suggestions for the climate businesses transition risks
Recommendations ‘recommendations’ report on how to include material and finance (policy & legal,
of the Task Force financial risks due to climate change in a company’s institutions technology, market,
on Climate-related required annual financial filings reputation); physical
Financial Disclosures risks (acute, chronic)
(Annex to
‘Recommendations
of the Task Force
on Climate-related
Financial Disclosures)
37

Recommendations TCFD 2017 Recommends financial disclosures done by companies climate businesses transition risks
of the Task Force for climate-related issues. Risks of climate change to (policy & legal,
on Climate-related companies, but especially regarding transition to a technology, market,
Financial Disclosures) low-carbon economy reputation); physical
risks (acute, chronic)
Biodiversity and The Biodiversity 2017 Brief summary of the business case for managing nature businesses Biodiversity risk;
ecosystem services: Consultancy biodiversity risk. social license to
the business case for operate, access to
managing risk and capital, litigation,
creating opportunity permitting,
disrupted operations
or supply chain
Net Positive Impact IUCN 2016 Introduces the concept of Net Positive Impact (NPI) on nature businesses NA
on biodiversity: biodiversity for businesses, including the business case
The business case for applying NPI
‘Climate value at risk’ Dietz, Bowen, Dixon, & 2016 Risk of climate change to the financial sector climate researchers, using IAM to
of global financial Gradwell “Estimate the impact of twenty-first-century climate businesses quantify risk in $
assets change on the present market value of global financial
assets….” At $2.5 trillion
Let’s talk about the Bank of England 2016 identification and description of physical risks and climate economists, physical risk and
weather: the impact (Batten, Sowerbutts transition risks for climate change impacting central central banks transition risk
of climate change on and Tanaka) banks and the economy
central banks
Natural Capital Natural Capital 2016 Further elaboration on Natural Capital Protocol on how nature organizations, impacts and
Protocol Principles Coalition to apply the natural capital framework in 9 steps businesses dependencies; risks
and Framework and opportunities
Natural Capital Natural Capital 2016 Protocol (framework) for organizations and businesses nature organizations, impacts and
Protocol Coalition to include consideration of natural capital in their businesses dependencies; risks
decision making and opportunities
Statement of Corporate Reporting 2016 This document overviews the common foundational nature investors, NA
Common Principles Dialogue principles of the CRD, for instance, the principle that regulators
of Materiality of the “material information is any information which is
Corporate Reporting reasonably capable of making a difference to the
Dialogue conclusions reasonable stakeholders may draw when
reviewing the related information.” Comparison of
materiality definitions used by different organizations
included on pages 5-8.
Stranded Assets in UNEP/SSEE 2016 “focus on the environment-related risk factors that nature researchers, Caldecott 2013.
Palm Oil Production: Morel, Friedman, can cause asset stranding in the national context of practitioners Risks are applied to
A case study of Tulloch, Caldecott Indonesia’s oil palm industry” asset types: physical,
Indonesia financial, social,
human; natural
risk factors:
likelihood, timing,
and potential scale
A Framework for UNEP/SSEE 2015 assessment and literature review on how to consider nature decision- not a risk
Protected Area Asset Paul Jepson, Caldecott, protected areas as an asset class, including case makers, framework; instead
Management Milligan, Chen examples from Brazil and Tanzania; includes risks to investors an ‘asset framework
PA assets and how to manage risks for Protected Areas
with five typologies:
investment, situated
assets, forms of
value, value capture,
and risk factors
Breaking the tragedy Carney, Mark (Bank of 2015 outlining a ‘tragedy of the horizon’ for climate risk, in climate insurance/ physical, liability,
of the horizon – England; with Phillips, which most risks are on a time horizon outside of the finance transition risks
climate change and Rhys and Weymarn, scope of businesses, FIs, and politics; calls for climate institutions
financial stability Ian de) risk disclosure and framework of physical, liability, and
transition risks
Linking forest D’Amato, Li, Rekola, 2015 Focus on conceptual options for the forest sector to nature researchers Ecosystem
ecosystem services Toppinen, & Lu evaluate/value ecosystem services services linked
to corporate to dependencies,
sustainability impacts, and
disclosure: A responses
conceptual analysis
38

The cost of inaction: Economist Intelligence 2015 Risk of climate change to the financial sector. Modelling climate FIs quantifying risks
Recognising the Unit finds that “risk to current manageable assets from
value at risk from climate change is $4.2 trillion” from ~2015-2100
climate change
Toward a risk Mace et al 2015 proposes a risk register to monitor natural capital nature policymakers, assigns high/med/
register for natural assets that are at risk of being unable to continue to researchers low risk to asset &
capital? provide expected benefits benefit relationships
in the UK
Environmental and ERBD 2014 Focus on environmental risks from business’s impacts; nature ERBD’s finan- Financial, Legal,
Social Risks putting forward risk framework for implementation by cial interme- Reputational risks
its financial intermediaries diaries (as a result of
company’s actions)
IPCC AR5 Climate IPCC 2014 Builds upon the risk concept set forward in SREX climate policy makers, IPCC: risk as a
Change 2014: to include feedbacks between risk, climate and governments, function of hazard,
Impacts, Adaptation, socioeconomic processes. Provides evidence on researchers, vulnerability,
and Vulnerability impacts, adaptation and vulnerability around the world. other stake- exposure,
holders socioeconomic
process and natural
variability/change
Financial Dynamics UNEP/SSEE 2014 reporting to summarize why finance sector should nature finance sector physical, legal,
of the Environment: Caldecott and care about environmental risks; to identify barriers technological,
Risks, Impacts, and McDaniels that would prevent managing risks; and to identify the reputational, credit
Barriers to Resilience groups working in this realm; “how environmental-
Working Paper for related risks could affect the financial sector and what
the UNEP Inquiry financial institutions can do to manage such risks”
Risky Business: The Gordon 2014 Economic risks of climate change in the US. Uses risk climate policy makers, risks categorized by
economic risks of assessment approach, economy wide and by sector. governments, region and impact
climate change in the stakeholders
United States
The New Climate The New Climate 2014 It is possible to have economic growth and address climate government, NA
Economy Economy climate change risks together businesses
Better Growth,
Better Climate
Opportunity Lost: ELD Initiative 2013 assessment of business exposure to land degradation nature businesses risks categorized
Mitigating risk and risk, including mitigation measures / opportunities as reduced
making the most of productivity,
your land assets. decreasing raw
An assessment of materials, political
the exposure of instability/social
business to land issues, regulatory/
degradation risk and legal
the opportunities
inherent in
sustainable land
management
Identifying natural Hewitt et al. 2013 Overviews materiality debate around scope, nature organizations ESG
capital risk and stakeholders and time frame. Provides table of
materiality materiality definitions used by ratings/disclosure
agencies on page 2.
Natural Capital at Trucost 2013 Concentration is on costs to the economy and society nature companies, Some mix of risk
Risk: The Top 100 from private businesses in the form of environmental investors, frameworks is
Externalities of externalities. governments, applied; ultimately,
Business TEEB business they’re concerned
coalition with risks as
businesses’
Private-sector Surminski 2013 Some companies are now addressing adaptation climate researchers environmental costs
adaptation to climate risks, but many aren’t, due to various barriers focused on private-
climate risk sector adaptation to
climate risks
39

Weathering the Center for Climate and 2013 Analysis of (mostly) traditional risk assessment climate policy makers, framework
storm: Building Energy Solutions approaches of 100 companies; recommends proactive organizations for managing
business resilience risk assessment and management, especially for climate risk: build
to climate change climate risks awareness, assess
vulnerabilities,
manage risks, review
Harnessing nature to Jones, Hole, & Zavaleta 2012 Policy Perspective at intersection of ecosystem service nature researchers NA
help people adapt to and climate change: advocates using ecosystem-based
climate change approaches for climate change adaptation
Is natural capital a Bonner et al. 2012 Early study on materiality of natural capital as an nature CFOs and Impacts and
material issue? issue for business. Barriers to action identified at that accountants dependencies as
time: lack of a standardized business case, low and overall framework.
lacking market values for biodiversity and ES, and 5 types: operational,
[appropriate] accounting principles. Given its focus on regulatory & legal,
measurement/accounting, the report includes trends reputational,
and current practices on valuation of biodiversity and markets & products,
ecosystem services in section 6. financing.
Managing the Risks IPCC 2012 IPCC special report on managing the risks of extreme climate policymakers, main framework
of Extreme Events Field et al eds. events/disasters for climate change adaptation, researchers is understanding
and Disasters to including grounding in disaster risk management disaster risk
Advance Climate and approaches to vulnerability and exposure, and through
Change Adaptation addressing uncertainty vulnerability,
(SREX report) exposure, and
climate events
Risk ready: New PwC 2012 Frames concerns with environmental lens through nature Businesses Operational/
approaches to threats to economic stability. Focus is on business-level and finance value chain risks,
environmental and risk management practices. institutions ‘exposures in the
social change landscape’ (i.e.
hazards)
The Corporate Hanson, C., J. 2012 Promotes the use of an ecosystem services review nature businesses Operational,
Ecosystem Services Ranganathan, (ESR) in order to protect against risks and exploit regulatory and
Review: Guidelines C. Iceland, and J. opportunities related corporate impacts and legal, reputational,
for Identifying Finisdore / WRI, dependencies on ES. Full suite of ES which can be market and
Business Risks and Meridian Institute, considered are taken from TEEB, corp narrows these product, financing
Opportunities Arising WBCSD down. Step by step guide provided on how to use
from Ecosystem the ESR, tests this on 5 WBCSD companies: BC Hydro,
Change. Version 2.0. Sygenta, Rio Tinto, Mondi and Akzo Nobel.
[ESR]
The Economics TEEB 2012 “the global economic benefit of biological diversity, nature businesses dependencies and
of Ecosystems the costs of the loss of biodiversity and the failure to and finance impacts
and Biodiversity take protective measures versus the costs of effective institutions
in Business and conservation” for the business community
Enterprise
Universal Ownership: UNEP FI & PRI 2011 Provides estimates of the current and future estimated nature Institutional quantifying financial
Why environmental monetary value of environmental degradation investors risks
externalities matter (via Trucost), in order to create a basis for large
to institutional institutional investors (i.e. universal owners) to
investors address externalities that have the greatest financial
implications. Focus is on unpriced externalities, both
the positive (e.g. ecosystem services) and negative
(e.g. pollution) -- premise that the failure to price these
appropriately will erode future benefits.
Biodiversity and WEF 2010 2010 briefing on biodiversity and risk for WEF. nature produced for physical, regulatory,
Business Risk Identified biodiversity loss as a major economic risk. participants market, other risks
includes a list of biodiversity risks in classic risk in biodiversity
typology (physical, regulatory, market, other), and discussions at
includes some limited case studies WEF annual
meeting
The cost of policy Braat & ten Brink 2008 2008 assessment of the “social and economic costs to nature European quantifying costs of
inaction mankind as a consequence of the losses of biodiversity” Commission, loss of biodiversity
for Review on
the Economics
of Biodiversity
Loss
The value of the Costanza et al. * 1997 Classic review paper assessing the value of ecosystem researchers researchers
world’s ecosystem services. 17 services; 16 biomes; $16-54 trillion per year quantifying the
services and natural value of ecosystem
capital services globally
40
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Nature of Risk: A Framework for Understanding Nature-Related Risk to Business

The Nature of Risk

The Nature of Risk

mindset.3 Climate-related risk and nature-related risk

Framework for Understanding risk awareness (including definitions of materiality),

RISK TYPES THREAT TYPE TOTAL

Regulatory & Legal Risk 14

*GHG – Greenhouse gas

RISK TYPES CONSEQUENCE TYPE TOTAL

Physical Risk Disruptions to business operations 7

Regulatory & Legal Risk Unexpected costs of compliance/fines for noncompliance 9

Market Risk Changes in the cost and availability of resources 4

Reputational Risk Lost sales due to negative perceptions of the institution 3

Financial Risk Increased cost of capital or lending requirements 5

BUSINESS CHANGE IN DEPENDENCIES THREAT VULNERABILITY EXPOSURE CONSEQUENCE(S)

CCRR Climate Change-Related Risk

List of Definitions ability to yield a flow of benefits to people under specific

Natural Capital (NC) – is a “way of thinking about the

At the same time, so do businesses’ dependencies—the

Based on a review of over 70 sources, the following

This report focuses specifically on understanding nature-

What this report does What this report doesn’t do

2. Literature Summary A number of reports focus on methods for identifying

and the amount of proactive risk mitigation undertaken.

Figure 3. High-level framework illustrating nature-related risk to business

Illustrating Nature-Related Risk with the ENCORE Database

with full disruption)

70 Total Production Processes with

60 High/Very High ES Dependencies

Integrated Oil & Gas

Metals and Mining

Water and Utilities

Apparel, Natural Fibers

Each of the four major types of NRR can accrue to

RISK TYPES THREAT TYPE TOTAL

Regulatory & Legal Risk 14

*GHG – Greenhouse gas

RISK TYPES CONSEQUENCE TYPE TOTAL

Physical Risk Disruptions to business operations 7

Regulatory & Legal Risk Unexpected costs of compliance/fines for noncompliance 9

Market Risk Changes in the cost and availability of resources 4

Reputational Risk Lost sales due to negative perceptions of the institution 3

Financial Risk Increased cost of capital or lending requirements 5

PHYSICAL RISK REGULATORY & LEGAL RISK

MARKET RISK REPUTATIONAL RISK

framework and typology are bolded to highlight how

BUSINESS CHANGE IN DEPENDENCIES THREAT VULNERABILITY EXPOSURE CONSEQUENCE(S)

As the largest oil spill in US history, the incident led to

Figure 5. High-level framework illustrating nature-related risk to BP

IMPACT-RELATED CHANGE IMPACTS

Photo: CC BY-SA 2.0

Photo: By Zaian. CC BY-SA 4.0

5.4 Case Study 4: PG&E Bankruptcy 5.5 Case Study Summary

Case Study 3, on German exporters in South Africa,

PG&E was not the only affected company, however, as

Annex 1: Data on Nature-Related Risk Counts

Risk Type Type, Driver, Specific Threat or Consequence Total

Environmental Risk Type N/A 13

Annex 1: Data on Nature-Related Risk Counts continued