IPBES12: Restoring the business and biodiversity balance

For decades, warnings of ecosystem collapse were treated as the domain of activists and specialised scientists. But, as of late January 2026, the conversation has fundamentally shifted with the UK Government’s Nature Security Assessment. The collapse of global ecosystems is a “grade-A” risk to national security and, by extension, the global financial system.

This week’s 12th session of the Plenary of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES12) represents a landmark moment for the corporate world. The plenary, taking place in Manchester, UK, will be invited to approve the Business and Biodiversity Assessment, a highly anticipated report that will fundamentally reshape how businesses understand and act to rebalance their relationship with nature.

The silent engine of GDP

All businesses depend on biodiversity and its associated ecosystem services, yet the impacts of their activities have long been overwhelmingly negative: 14 out of 18 categories of nature’s contributions to people show declines since 19701. Several critical global ecosystems such as the Amazon, the Congo Basin, boreal forests, the Himalayas, and Southeast Asia’s coral reefs and mangroves are on a “pathway to collapse”.

These are not abstract losses. These regions regulate the very climate, water cycles, and weather patterns that underpin our global food supply. For the private sector, this isn’t just about ethics; it’s about supply chain solvency and can lead to systemic collapse.

According to the World Economic Forum, more than half of the world’s total GDP – approximately $44trn — is moderately or highly dependent on nature. From the insects that pollinate our crops to the wetlands that filter our water and the forests that stabilise our climate, “ecosystem services” are the silent employees that never send an invoice.

When these services vanish, the costs are not just environmental; they are fiscal. The Dasgupta Review on the Economics of Biodiversity highlighted our current economic measures, like GDP, fail to account for the depreciation of “natural capital.”

The enabling environment imperative

The finance sector is no longer a bystander in the nature crisis. The narrative that private finance is solely a driver of ecosystem destruction is beginning to shift. While the scale of “nature-negative” investments remains vastly disproportionate to conservation funding, the last few years have seen a surge in concrete, innovative action from the financial sector to protect biodiversity and hedge against systemic risk.

Financial institutions are increasingly recognising that biodiversity loss presents an “unhedgeble risk” and are channelling capital into tangible solutions. However, private finance still makes currently up less than 20% of total biodiversity funding.

Despite strong interest, as reflected in the latest Finance for Biodiversity Impact Report, the primary barrier is an inadequate “enabling environment” that fails to translate ecological risk into material financial risk and nature-positive opportunities into clear returns. Creating this environment requires targeted interventions from policymakers and regulators to reshape market dynamics.

The IPBES Assessment is an important scientific exercise that comes at a time when there is increasing recognition of the central role of businesses in halting biodiversity loss; the choice is no longer whether to act, but how quickly they can adapt.

The financial sector has stepped up its own commitment but requires a clear, consistent policy landscape to de-risk investments and channel capital at the necessary scale – the ball is now firmly in the court of governments to create an environment that will help businesses to restore the biodiversity balance and accelerate our transition to a nature-positive economy that will benefit us all.