The United Nations Environment Programme Finance Initiative (UNEP FI), in a joint article with the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), mapped how biodiversity loss is increasingly being treated as a systemic financial risk and why comparable, decision-useful nature-related corporate reporting is becoming a core input to banks’ and insurers’ risk assessment, portfolio analysis and client engagement. The article pointed to supervisory and policy momentum across jurisdictions, citing the European Central Bank’s integration of ecosystem degradation into its monetary policy statement, South Africa’s Prudential Authority pilot assessments of bank exposures to nature-related risks, and the expansion of China’s green finance framework to include transition and biodiversity finance. It also highlighted persistent data constraints, referencing IPBES findings that fewer than 1 percent of publicly reporting companies disclose biodiversity impacts and an IPBES survey of financial institutions representing around 30 percent of global market capitalisation that identified data availability, and gaps in metrics, models and scenarios, as key barriers to nature-related risk assessments. Against this backdrop, it summarised key reporting and standard-setting developments including the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) guidance, GRI’s updated Biodiversity Standard (GRI 101) effective since January 2026, and UNEP FI’s “Accountability for Nature” report’s observations on location-specific metrics and value-chain impacts. Looking ahead, the International Sustainability Standards Board (ISSB) has moved its biodiversity, ecosystems and ecosystem services (BEES) project from research to standard-setting and plans an exposure draft ahead of COP17 in Yerevan in October 2026, while GRI’s Financial Services Sector Standards are due later in 2026 to clarify disclosures related to financing and insurance activities.
United Nations Environment Programme Finance Initiative 2026-04-22
United Nations Environment Programme Finance Initiative and Global Reporting Initiative outline how nature-related disclosures are becoming central to financial risk management
The United Nations Environment Programme Finance Initiative and the Global Reporting Initiative outlined how biodiversity loss is becoming a systemic financial risk and why comparable, decision-useful nature-related corporate reporting is central to banks’ and insurers’ risk assessment, portfolio analysis and client engagement. The article highlighted growing supervisory and policy momentum, persistent data and methodological constraints, and recent developments including Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures guidance, GRI’s updated Biodiversity Standard and UNEP FI’s work on location-specific and value-chain metrics. It noted that the International Sustainability Standards Board has advanced its biodiversity project to standard-setting and that GRI plans Financial Services Sector Standards in 2026.