Siobhan Stewart, Relationships Manager, Natural Capital Coalition
As the natural capital approach develops and enters the mainstream we are finding a growing disconnect.
Increasing numbers of financial institutions, businesses and governments are recognising our material dependence on natural capital. Despite this, organizations who have fully integrated natural capital thinking into their strategy are still a relative minority. The Bank of England recently reported that while 70% of banks agree that climate change poses financial risks, only 10% are comprehensively managing these risks.
So how have these early adopters gone about overcoming the barriers to scaling? Here are some of our top tips for maximising the potential of natural capital within your own organization:
- Gather leaders from other departments to discuss where your operations could benefit from better information about natural capital risks and opportunities. This could be environmental, value chain, risk management, strategy, sourcing or other key departments.
- Frame the conversation in terms they will be familiar with. Operations might be interested in efficiency savings, while sourcing departments might be concerned about environmental risk in their upstream supply chain.
- Engage the C-Suite- many of the leading companies in this space are driven by engagement from the top of the organization.
- If board support isn’t forthcoming, are there any crisis or pain points that could be leveraged as a reason to try out a new way of thinking?
- Take a look at resources such as the Natural Capital Protocol, the Protocol Toolkit and case studies from other businesses in your sector or region.
- Are you missing any skills? Get in touch with the Natural Capital Coalition who can advise you on which technical advisors could help to conduct your assessment, or what courses enable you to build capacity within your organization.
Read the full report here.
