TNFD teams up with WWF to improve nature-related corporate disclosures

The Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) and the World Wide Fund (WWF) have announced plans to collaborate on a new initiative to improve nature-related data.

In recent years, the WWF has been developing a methodology, known as “geospatial ESG” to give financial institutions greater insight into the environmental impact of assets, companies, and sovereign states. Thereby allowing them to differentiate on environmental performance to aid realignment towards truly sustainable development.

Over the same time period, the TNFD, of which WWF was a founding member, initiated the development of a global Nature Data Public Facility (NDPF), which aims to enable companies and financial institutions to effectively identify, assess, disclose and manage their nature-related issues.

As such, the TNFD and WWF said they plan to collaborate with this year’s UN Biodiversity Conference to integrate these insights into the NDPF.

In addition to this, the WWF also published a report with its own recommendations for corporate nature target setting in the context of European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS) disclosures.

According to the report, targets need to be science-based and relate to both ecosystem and nature pressures, as well as being geography-specific.

COP16

The announcement comes as representatives of 196 countries are gathering in Cali, Colombia, for the 16th United Nations’ Conference of the Parties summit (COP16), which starts today and runs until 1 November.

“This announcement underscores the need for organisations right across the nature data value chain, from primary data collectors to end users, to come together to improve the quality, timeliness and decision usefulness of nature-related data,” said Catherine Armour, director of data Initiatives at the TNFD.

Greater nature-related data

COP16 is the first biodiversity-focused meeting since 2022, when governments struck a deal to halt the destruction of ecosystems. Industry leaders and stakeholders hope this year’s summit will provide a greater level of policy certainty.

The TNFD confirmed in a statement that it intends to release the blueprint and development roadmap for the NDPF at the World Biodiversity Summit which coincides with COP16.

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