Interactive Guide on Natural Capital & Financial Institutions

VBDO and CREM present a unique interactive guide and self-assessment tool on natural capital for financial institutions.

What is Natural Capital?

Governments, companies and financial institutions are increasingly using the term natural capital to describe the goods and services provided by the natural world on which society and industry rely. Examples are natural resources such as timber and clean water. These goods and services are vital to the economic system and material for financial institutions.

The Natural Capital guide and the self-assessment tool

The guide provides practical guidance to financial institutions that wish to take their interactions with natural capital into account in their investment management. For example, how natural capital can be translated to responsible investment strategies such as exclusion, active ownership, ESG-integration or impact investing. Also, guidance is provided on how financial institutions can be transparent in their actions and impact regarding natural capital.

The self-assessment tool is an easy-to-use guide for financial institutions to see where they can improve regarding natural capital and also, to look up which sections of the guide are of special interest.

Financial institutions are invited to return their filled in self-assessment tool before March 20, 2016. All the financial institutions that send back their score will then in return receive the aggregated average scores of their peers and gain a chance to win free consultancy advice provided by CREM.

Target group of the guide & self-assessment tool

The primary target groups of this guide are sustainability officers, environmental and sustainability specialists, and risk departments at financial institutions. The target groups wish to explore the business case and opportunities of integrating natural capital into their organization’s policies and responsible investment decisions.

Download de self-assessment tool here.