GARP, the Global Association of Risk Professionals, has published the results of its inaugural ‘Global Survey of Nature Risk Management Across Financial Firms’.
Nature loss has a profound impact on the economy and is a source of significant risk for financial institutions says GARP. Moreover, ‘nature’s resilience is vital in the battle against climate change. With nature risk management in its very early stages there is still significant work that needs to be done’.
To better understand how the risks and opportunities are being managed in today’s economic landscape, GARP undertook its first-ever global study of nature-related financial risk management across financial firms.
Key points from the survey results include:
- There is a growing regulatory focus on nature risks, with 31% of firms reporting that their regulators have published formal expectations for nature risk management and another 13% expecting their regulators to do so.
- Nearly half of the boards in the sample have oversight of nature-related risks and opportunities, with most of the remaining firms working or intending to work on this.
- Nature risk is relatively new for many firms and levels of expertise are far lower than for climate risk, with over 40% of firms still currently investigating whether it should even be treated as a risk.
- Just 17% of firms are using metrics, targets, or limits to assess drivers of nature-related risks, with another 13% implementing them now.
- Nature-risk staffing and training is on the rise, with around half of firms offering nature-risk training to some functions and 13% of firms offering it to their entire staff.
