Don’t miss the free webinar “Towards a standard for biodiversity measurement and valuation for companies” on Tuesday 12 July
The Biodiversity Foundation of the Ministry for the Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge (MITECO), within the framework of the Community of Practice of the Spanish Business and Biodiversity Initiative (IEEB), organizes on July 12, from 10:00 a.m. to 11:30 a.m., the free webinar “Towards a standard for the measurement and valuation of biodiversity for companies”. in order to bring the recommendations of the European Union’s (EU) Align project —Aligning accounting approaches for nature— closer to the Spanish business sector.
The European Union’s Align project is supporting the European Commission in its efforts to facilitate the development of standardised natural capital accounting practices for the business and financial sector and other stakeholders, including the development of homogeneous metrics to measure biodiversity.
The recommendations developed by the Align project represent a milestone for companies and financial institutions, as they provide an agreed set of principles and technical criteria that establish ‘what‘ elements of biodiversity should be measured and valued and ‘how’ should be done in different decision-making contexts.
Recently, Align has opened for public consultation, and until July 15, its recommendations on a standard for the measurement and valuation of biodiversity, applicable to any sector anywhere in the world.
Agenda of the online session:
- 10:00 a.m. Welcome. Sonia Castañeda, deputy director of Green Economy and Employment and International Relations of the Biodiversity Foundation; and David Álvarez, executive director of Ecoacsa.
- 10:15 a.m. Presentation of the Align project and recommendations on a standard for the measurement and valuation of biodiversity for companies. Marta Santamaría, Senior Director of the Capitals Coalition.
- 10:30 a.m. Companies advancing in the measurement and valuation of biodiversity. Practical examples. Marta Santamaría, Capitals Coalition.
- 10:45 a.m. Discussion.
- 11:05 a.m. Context of the IEEB Community of Practice. David Álvarez, Ecoacsa.
- 11:20 a.m. Closing. Sonia Castañeda, IEEB – Biodiversity Foundation.
The webinar is aimed at Environment and Sustainability Managers of companies of all sizes (listed and unlisted) and sectors of activity, consultants who support companies to measure, assess and report on the biodiversity performance of organizations, funds, products or parts of an organization, regulators and civil society with an interest in understanding how companies manage their impacts and their dependence on biodiversity.
This action is part of the IEEB’s transformation and innovation process promoted by the Biodiversity Foundation, which seeks to reinforce the usefulness of the initiative and motivate greater business participation through a more practical approach based on the exchange of knowledge and good practices and collaboration with initiatives, projects and relevant market players in the field of biodiversity. Specifically, this webinar is part of the activities of the IEEB Community of Practice, which has been set up with the aim of developing specialized knowledge on biodiversity by sharing learning, knowledge and good practices based on shared reflection on the experiences of its members.
Context and motivation of the Align Project
Biodiversity is declining at an unprecedented rate. In part, this is because the value of nature is not integrated into current economic thinking. While approaches to measuring corporate biodiversity performance are emerging, they are not aligned. As a result, efforts to manage natural capital rarely consider biodiversity. This results in risks that are not managed and opportunities that are not taken advantage of.
In addition, business measurement and reporting on natural capital in general and biodiversity in particular is extremely limited. For many companies, the quality of biodiversity information is poor and provides little data on risk or business performance, as it focuses primarily on management aspects and provides little non-monetary quantitative information. However, companies are increasingly understanding the need to be able to robustly and consistently measure the impacts their activities have on biodiversity and their dependencies on it.
There is an urgent need to align existing approaches to measuring and valuing biodiversity and the growing demand for quantitative measures by investors and auditors to improve clarity and build consensus on how companies and financial institutions can measure and report on their performance in this area.
Links of interest:
Link to the Align project website: https://ec.europa.eu/environment/biodiversity/business/align/index_en.htm
Link to the consultation (prior registration): https://capitalscoalition.scribehub.com/documents/14
