TNFD
The Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures
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Short video: The Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures: What it is, who’s behind it and why it’s a major greenwashing risk. Credit: Global Forest Coalition. From December 2022. The final framework does include lobbying disclosures but little changed in the final September 2023 framework.
Complaint to UNEP on TNFD
Ten civil society and rights holder organizations and networks – whose members include over 200 organizations on five continents – file a complaint to the UNEP grievance mechanism. The complaint alleges that UNEP – in co-founding and continuing to support the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) – has breached its own policies on environmental defenders, gender equity, access to information and the precautionary approach. It also highlights that 45% of taskforce members face serious environmental and human rights concerns. This includes legal cases, OECD cases, investor exclusions and mass payments. This also directly undermines the work of environmental defenders seeking justice. The complaint is filed by Rainforest Action Network, Forests & Finance coalition, Global Forest Coalition, BankTrack, Milieudefensie, Third World Network, Women’s Earth and Climate Action Network, Friends of the Earth International, Indigenous Environmental Network and Movimento pelo Soberania Popular no Mineração.
About this page
This page will be updated over time. We welcome feedback and additional information from rights holders, civil society groups or others wishing to share their experiences, recommendations, questions or concerns regarding TNFD. You can contact Shona Hawkes at shona@ran.org or on WhatsApp/Signal/Telegram: +61 413 100 864. We also welcome media inquiries.
Timeline and Resources
Below is a summary of key documents and events, starting with the most recent. It focuses on collating the various efforts by NGOs, rights holders and CSO networks to raise concerns about the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD), particularly in the May 2023 Open Letter to TNFD. This includes many issues and warnings that have been raised, and largely ignored, since the early days of TNFD’s drafting.
October 2024: TNFD announces a new set of ‘adopters’ – companies that have committed to produce a TNFD report. The TNFD press release claims that “[TNFD] operationalises the specific requirements of Target 15 of the GBF, calling on governments to introduce requirements by 2030 for corporate reporting of nature-related dependencies, impacts and risks.” This statement is, at best, misleading. TNFD’s baseline on materiality does not cover reporting business impacts on nature (TNFD glossary, p.41) and is not ‘aligned’ or ‘operationalising’ Target 15 in various ways (see here or here). The GBF objective is to halt and reverse biodiversity loss by 2030 – Target 15 specifically discusses the objective of reducing negative impacts on biodiversity not just reporting.
October 2024: 10 civil society and rights holder organizations and networks – whose members include over 200 organizations on five continents – file a complaint to the UNEP grievance mechanism. The complaint alleges that UNEP – in co-founding and continuing to support the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) – has breached its own policies on environmental defenders, gender equity, access to information and the precautionary approach. It also highlights that 45% of taskforce members face serious environmental and human rights concerns. This includes legal cases, OECD cases, investor exclusions and mass payments. This also directly undermines the work of environmental defenders seeking justice. The complaint is filed by Rainforest Action Network, Forests & Finance coalition, Global Forest Coalition, BankTrack, Milieudefensie, Third World Network, Women’s Earth and Climate Action Network, Friends of the Earth International, Indigenous Environmental Network and Movimento pelo Soberania Popular no Mineração.
See also: Press release, blog and full complaint filed with the Independent Office for Stakeholder Safeguard-related Response (IOSSR) and Director of Corporate Service Division of the UN Environment Programme.
October 2024: Milieudefensie publish a new paper on the failure of voluntary mechanisms, with a specific focus on the TNFD.
October 2024: BankTrack publish a new campaign webpage on the TNFD.
October 2024: During the Biodiversity COP (CBD) Rainforest Action Network/Forests & Finance is invited to do presentations about the TNFD at various events on 22 October, 25 October and 28 October.
October 2024: CBD Alliance publication ECO article TNFD is not aligned with the Global Biodiversity Framework (also Spanish), particularly relevant for negotiators.
October 2024: 14 NGOs and networks, led by Friends of the Earth International, write a letter to the Executive Secretary of the CBD about concerns about the ‘mainstreaming’ process. It calls out concerns about a host of false solutions – including TNFD. Also in Spanish.
October 2024: The Banking on Biodiversity Collapse report includes a case study examining agribusiness trader Bunge’s TNFD report comparing it with existing information and controversies of its biodiversity and human rights impacts in the Cerrado. The BoBC report also found that 9 of the top 30 forest-risk banks were TNFD members. Further examples of company TNFD reports can be found on the TNFD website here.
October 2024: The Forests & Finance coalition release the Regulating Finance for Biodiversity report. This examines a host of regulations in five jurisdictions. It highlights weakness and strengths in current laws, and show that much more must be done to realise the Global Biodiversity Framework Target 14 to shift financial flows.
September 2024: Rainforest Action Network presentation about TNFD to the CBD Alliance webinar ‘Finance, biodiversity and justice’.
June 2024: TNFD announces a new Co-Chair to replace Elizabeth Maruma Mrema who stepped down in March. In a press release the new Co-Chair, Razan Al Mubarak, president of the IUCN explicitly expresses their intention to embed the corporate-led TNFD framework in public policy. Noting: “I look forward to helping lead the Taskforce’s efforts as we seek to embed the TNFD recommendations in the global corporate reporting architecture aligned with the commitment of over 190 governments around the world to Target 15 of the Global Biodiversity Framework.”
May 2024: Bryan Bixcul – Maya Tz’utujil person and staff member of Indigenous rights organization Cultural Survival – publishes an article on Indigenous peoples, biodiversity and the responsibilities of financial institutions. Of TNFD, the author writes “the TNFD doesn’t do enough to protect Indigenous rights and biodiversity. It allows for self-reporting, so companies and financial institutions get to choose what they want to report, and it doesn’t allow for a grievance mechanism, so communities don’t have a way of starting a complaint when violations have occurred” also adding “The TNFD is nothing more than the private sector’s efforts to institutionalize their avoidance of human rights and biodiversity responsibilities”.
May 2024: Forests & Finance coalition release the briefer Regulating Finance: A precondition to regulating the Global Biodiversity Framework. This lists TNFD as a ‘false solution’ that distracts from meaningful implementation of the Global Biodiversity Framework. Also available in Spanish, French, Portuguese and Indonesian.
March 2024: Rainforest Action Network submits feedback to TNFD on two of its draft guidances issued in December. RAN’s feedback can be seen here on Food and agriculture and on Finance.
March 2024: RAN presentation on TNFD for staff at Third World Network.
January 2024: Global Witness is quoted by Reuters in an article about TNFD. This raises several concerns including that “TNFD will increase data availability, but it won’t change the incentives for making a quick buck from funding companies that treat nature like a disposable resource”.
January 2024: At Davos, TNFD announces a list of 320 ‘early adopter’ companies that will start TNFD reporting in 2024 and 2025. Several CSOs issue a joint media release in response.
January 2024: A committee of UK MPs investigating how to stop finance flowing to companies deforesting abroad reject the TNFD’s theory of change, concluding more data reporting would be insufficient without a national due diligence law to ensure financial actors cut off deforestation clients in practice.
January 2024: French publication Novethic article on TNFD references CSO critique of TNFD including its failure to require reporting on complaints about biodiversity or human rights, that it doesn’t sufficiently take into account the rights of communities where companies operate nor require reporting based on double materiality.
December 2023 – TNFD releases a series of new or updated draft sector guidances that focus primarily on company self-assessment, but include some recommendations on disclosure. Feedback is due by 29 March 2024 and will not be made public. Draft guidances are: Aquaculture, Biotechnology and pharmaceuticals, Chemicals, Electric utilities and power generation, Finance, Food and agriculture, Forestry and paper, Metals and Mining and Oil and gas.
November 2023: The article, ‘Moving beyond a tokenistic participation of Indigenous Peoples in nature financing‘, written by an anonymous Indigenous author, critiques the TNFD – and various other initiatives – approach to Indigenous Peoples’ rights. On TNFD, the article emphasizes that it fails to respect the forms of disclosure emphasized by Indigenous Peoples or to protect and respect their rights. Also adding: “To answer whether the framework would be effective for uncovering environmental damage on Indigenous territories, one simply needs to ask: What would self-disclosure look like for a company whose business model is reliant on displacing Indigenous Peoples from their territories and destroying their territories, either directly or through their value chains? Most likely, the company would use their TNFD report to greenwash, by claiming that they “engaged” some group of Indigenous people, without providing the transparency required.”
November 2023: Green Central Banking publish an article ‘The TNFD is written by corporations, not biodiversity leaders…and it shows‘ authored by Rainforest Action Network.
October 2023: RAN presentation on the final TNFD framework at a side event to the UN Principles on Responsible Investment in Person conference. This includes highlighting that the TNFD framework does not align with the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework.
September 2023: RAN makes a submission to the UK Environmental Audit Committee in response to its call for views on TNFD. The submission provides an overview of concerns related to TNFD’s processes, structure and final framework recommendations.
September 2023: The Canary article The corporations making up the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosure hold a prolific record of ecological and human rights violations writes that company groups on the TNFD taskforce have faced close to 300 allegations of rights violations in just 10 years.
September 2023: The FT critiques the lack of black representation and geographic representation on the TNFD taskforce and notes: “While it is a valuable, carefully considered contribution to this space, this week’s publication by the TNFD should be seen for what it is: a document produced by a group of corporate and financial executives, which must inevitably reflect their interests and priorities. It cannot be a legitimate foundation for a massively important new area of regulation, which will have implications for every person and species on the planet.” Green Central Banking, Bloomberg and Eco-Business reporting also reference CSO concerns.
September 2023: CSOs issue a joint press release on the launch of TNFD: ‘Final framework launches to ongoing fears of greenwashing‘.
September 2023: TNFD’s final framework is launched at an invite-only event in New York, with additional documents.
September 2023: Rainforest Action Network releases a pre-emptive press release ahead of the TNFD framework launch, based on TNFD’s failure to act on key greenwashing concerns throughout its process.
August 2023: An Eco-Business article about TNFD notes that it has been welcomed by market participants but that “NGOs are skeptical of whether it will address the role of large companies in driving biodiversity loss” and cites the May 2023 CSO Open Letter.
June 2023: An article by Rainforest Action Network is published on the BankTrack website: ‘Two months ago 62 organizations and 3 Goldman Environmental Prize winners wrote an Open Letter to the TNFD: No one responded’.
July 2023: An open access article in the academic journal Conservation Letters “Risky Business” raises many concerns about the TNFD, including that it is a form of corporate capture of public decision-making. It is also available in an unofficial Chinese translation.
June 2023: A letter published in the journal Nature, led by a Professor of Accounting and Risk, cites the recent CSO open letter and raises concerns about the lack of scientists in TNFD’s governance structures, and the risks of corporate capture including a “greenwashing risk” of regulatory processes. Environmental Finance reports on the Nature article under the heading ‘TNFD criticised for lack of scientists in governance’.
June 2023: Media outlet Environmental Finance puts key concerns raised in the 2023 CSO open letter to TNFD – including that TNFD has failed to propose disclosures on links to rights violations, lobbying around nature or nature-related complaints against companies, and that it has not included the voices of youth or a gender analysis of its work. In response, TNFD discusses its stakeholder engagement but does not respond to the substantive points raised.
June 2023 – A new briefing paper calls on financial institutions to commit to five key principles to align their activities with the Global Biodiversity Framework. It is written by the Bank Information Centre, BankTrack, Friends of the Earth US and Rainforest Action Network.
June 2023: Forest Peoples Programme publishes a blog ‘TNFD must integrate the rights of indigenous peoples and local communities in its framework’ highlighting concerns with TNFD’s current approach and why it is critical that it adopts necessary human rights provisions.
June 2023: A submission to TNFD from the School of Biological and Behavioural Sciences, Queen Mary University of London notes that “there is a risk that insufficient attention to the extinction crisis undermines the credibility of the TNFD Framework”. Carbon Pulse report on the submission.
June 2023: The International Indigenous Forum on Biodiversity makes a submission to the TNFD. It makes a host of recommendations, particularly raising that TNFD does not align with Indigenous Peoples’ rights under international human rights law or the more rights-centered framework of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework. NGOs Forest Peoples Programme, BankTrack and Global Witness also make submissions. As of September 2023 public comment letters no longer seem to appear on the TNFD website. The Forests & Finance coalition has an archive of all public comment letters which can be accessed here. Almost two-thirds of comment letters on v.4 were not public.
May 2023 – 62 civil society organizations and networks – whose members include over 370 groups across 85+ countries on six continents – as well as three winners of the Goldman Environmental Prize write an open letter to the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) highlighting that its final draft fails to address some of its worst flaws that will facilitate greenwashing. The letter is in multiple languages. See also a press release here. Capital Monitor report on the letter.
March 2023 – Before the release of the TNFD’s final draft, Rainforest Action Network publishes a blog on Key questions to ask of TNFD’s final draft. This includes highlighting a real-world example of the types of concerns that poor nature-related reporting can lead to.
March 2023 – Throughout early 2023, cross-party UK parliamentarians, NGOs and even a TNFD co-founder raise concerns that instead of the government regulating the UK financing behind deforestation – as advised by its own taskforce – TNFD is promoted as a solution (i.e. statements by Lady Boycott and Global Canopy). In January, the former Chair of Barclays UK and the UK government-appointed Global Resources Initiative taskforce publicly wrote that “[The GRI] analysis concluded this to be necessary because risk reporting mechanisms such as the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) and voluntary net zero pledges are insufficient to prevent deforestation financing.”
March 2023 – Global Witness briefing TNFD will not stop UK banks from financing deforestation, contrary to the government’s argument.
March 2023: TNFD launches the fourth draft of its framework.
February 2023 – RAN provides a detailed submission to TNFD on draft 3 of its proposed framework. This repeats various concerns raised by rightsholder and civil society groups since version 1 and presents evidence of the TNFD’s adverse impacts on public policy.
December 2022 – Impact Investor reports on civil society concerns about TNFD. Mongabay’s comprehensive rundown of COP 15 notes concerns about the environmental and social record of several TNFD taskforce members.
December 2022 – The Global Forest Coalition, Friends of the Earth International, the CBD Alliance, EcoNexus and the Forests and Finance coalition raise concerns about TNFD throughout COP 15 in Montreal. This includes at press conferences on 7 December, 15 December, 16 December and 19 December, at panels and video screenings on 8 December and 13 December, in the EcoNexus publication provided to delegates on 15 and 17 December, in a high-level meeting with the CBD Executive Secretary, in press releases and briefings and in questions raised to TNFD representatives at events. This includes concern that a corporate push for TNFD-style business reporting at COP 15 usurped long-standing community calls focused on legal accountability for business impacts on nature and people.
December 2022 – Friends of the Earth International Nature of Business report raises concerns about corporate capture of global biodiversity discussions, including the role of TNFD.
December 2022 – The Global Forest Coalition and Forests and Finance coalition release a 4-minute video about TNFD in English, French, Spanish, Bahasa Indonesian and Portuguese. This video is included in the Women’s Earth and Climate Action Network briefing on COP 15.
December 2022 – Trilogue discussions in the EU agree on a new law to combat deforestation in imported forest-risk commodities, and commit to developing a regulatory proposal on financial institutions’ links to deforestation.
November 2022 – The civil society CBD Alliance releases an update of its paper ‘The ingredients for a successful Global Biodiversity Framework’, which includes critique of TNFD.
November 2022: Civil society groups’ press release on TNFD’s draft 3: ‘TNFD’s reputation as the next frontier for corporate greenwashing on nature remains firmly intact’. Rainforest Action Network collates its first impressions on TNFD’s draft.
November 2022: TNFD releases its Beta v.03 framework as well as a series of other papers accessible here.
November 2022: Rainforest Action Network presentation to the International Indigenous Forum on Biodiversity on TNFD.
October 2022: Rainforest Action Network presentation to Global Canopy discussing proof of concept examples of how TNFD could incorporate human rights reporting.
October 2022: Bloomberg covers the October CSO open letter (see below) and taskforce member BNP Paribas goes on the record for being ‘all for’ double materiality in TNFD.
October 2022: 48 organizations and networks – whose members include over 220 organizations on 6 continents – write an open letter to TNFD with “profound concerns” about its work.[xi]
September 2022: Four organizations and networks write to TNFD outlining detailed concerns. They outline that TNFD risks instituting greenwashing and call for an evidence-led approach
September 2022: The UN Working Group on Business and Human Rights releases its report into Corporate influence and the regulatory sphere. The report stresses the need for transparency, reporting on corporate lobbying and ensuring that a diverse array of stakeholders – including civil society organizations and Indigenous Peoples organizations are at the heart of decision-making, including on environmental policy. It also stresses the importance of remedy.
September 2022: The EU Parliament votes in favor of legal measures to ensure that products sold in the EU do not come from deforested or degraded land, which also includes human rights provisions. This includes a vote in favor of requirements to cover financial institutions. The final law is now being negotiated through the European tripartite process.
September 2022: A new blog on the BankTrack website: Planning for public disclosures through hidden closed-door processes?: Why the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures needs to overhaul its approach to transparency
September 2022: RAN publishes a press briefer on TNFD.
September 2022: This Forests & Finance coalition webpage on TNFD is launched.
August 2022: RAN publishes a technical blog: New evidence reiterates that TNFD doesn’t have a mandate for its ‘enterprise value’ only approach
August 2022: Global Forest Coalition publishes a blog outlining concerns: You’ve probably never heard about TNFD, but it threatens to be the new frontier in corporate greenwashing
August 2022: Thirteen civil society organizations issue a joint press release stating that the UN-backed TNFD risks being the “new frontier for corporate greenwashing on nature”[x]. It outlines deep concerns with TNFD’s June 2022 draft (Beta v0.2), which fails to incorporate recommendations raised by 28 NGOs and networks in May 2022.
July 2022: The Co-Chair of TNFD states that in future TNFD should be made mandatory.
Note: The international negotiations for a new landmark agreement on biodiversity – the global diversity framework – have already agreed language under Target 15 that outlines that business and financial institutions should “regularly monitor, assess, and fully and transparently disclose their impacts on biodiversity”. TNFD’s proposals to date do not require impact reporting.
July 2022: A new report by the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) – the leading global research body on biodiversity – stresses the role of justice in outcomes for nature and people. It also highlights the importance of diversity and accountability in decision-making.
June 2022: The UK government publishes its Global Resource Initiative taskforce Finance Report. The multi-stakeholder taskforce was first set up in July 2019. The taskforce and supporting working groups involved individuals from finance, corporations and NGOs – including groups who set up TNFD. The report strongly recommends that the UK government pass legislation to stop UK financing linked to deforestation. It outlines why voluntary initiatives and reporting-only approaches alone are insufficient to halt the financing behind deforestation.
June 2022: TNFD publishes the second draft of its framework (Beta v0.2). It also publishes a TNFD data discussion paper and a TNFD piloting guide for businesses that are piloting its framework.
June 2022: Piloting the TNFD framework with business begins. TNFD has five separate pilot programs, each involving multiple companies testing and providing feedback on its proposal.
June 2022: Rainforest Action Network publishes an Op Ed in Euroactiv raising concerns with TNFD.
May 2022: The international Network for Greening of the Financial System of central banks and supervisors announces its 2022-2024 workplan. This will include prioritizing a task force on nature-related risks chaired by staff at Banque de France and De Nederlandsche Bank.
Analysis of national economies’ exposure to, or impacts on, nature have also been undertaken by central banks in France, the Netherlands and Malaysia.
May 2022: Rainforest Action Network writes a submission to the UN Business and Human Rights working group looking at Corporate Influence in the Political and Regulatory Sphere. This presented TNFD as a case study of systemic issues regarding the undue influence of the private sector in financial sector initiatives endorsed by governments and/or in political and regulatory discussions.
May 2022: A Joint NGO Open Letter to TNFD signed by 28 NGOs and organizations raises key concerns and recommendations on the March 2022 draft. This included concerns regarding exclusion of rights holders and Global South CSOs from TNFD’s consultation process, the exclusion of human rights, the need for TNFD to explicitly require business to report on actual and potential adverse risks and impacts to nature and people, and concerns that it is setting a lower standard than existing corporate initiatives in high-risk industries. Rainforest Action Network also provides a 98-page technical submission.
May 2022: TNFD announces a partnership with IUCN to engage Indigenous Peoples and local communities.
May 2022: The Task Force on Inequality-related Disclosures (TIFD) launches information materials aimed at both experts and lay people. It’s FAQ explains its aims and relevance to different stakeholders, including CSOs, its twitter feed helps to explain key concepts and it is seeking help to create a genuine co-design process. By contrast, TNFD’s materials are almost impossible for non-financial experts to understand.
April 2022: The need for TNFD to focus more on outcomes for nature, not just business ‘dependencies’, is also raised by Cardano and its investor subsidiary Actiam.
March 2022: A Third World Network briefing paper on the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) talks also references concerns (p.4) that TNFD could make finance more expensive for certain countries (later elaborated further).
March 2022: A Network for Greening of the Financial System and INSPIRE study group final report is released. This references what it calls the ‘endogeneity of risk’– that businesses who contribute to environmental harms, may not be the most impacted from those harms. Therefore it is important to ensure analysis and research into nature and biodiversity-related risks and the financial system considers impacts not just financial materiality.
March 2022: TNFD launches the first draft of its framework, Beta v0.1. It will be further refined through three more drafts before being finalized in September 2023.
November 2021: A joint NGO statement on voluntary initiatives on deforestation for or by financial institutions outlined 7 basic questions to help distinguish false solutions from real change. (Also Bahasa Indonesia and Portuguese).
The TNFD framework, announced in September 2023, meets none of these measures.
October 2021: The Kunming Declaration includes commitments to “to respect, protect and promote human rights obligations when taking actions to protect biodiversity”. This comes as part of ongoing talks on a Post-2020 global biodiversity framework.
Note: Expectations on human rights in business and/or environmental efforts are also referenced in other international commitments such as the Glasgow Leaders Declaration on Forests and Land Use, the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises and the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.
October 2021: The Global Reporting Initiative publishes its revised Universal Standard that will take effect on 1 January 2023. The GRI first began in 2000, and now is a voluntary set of standards that most of the world’s largest businesses already report against. The GRI requires all businesses’ reporting under GRI (including on biodiversity) to include human rights reporting.
June 2021: The Informal Working Group to the TNFD publishes its Nature in Scope report which includes a summary of the proposed scope, governance, work plan, communication and resourcing plan of TNFD. Notably its list of who beneficiaries from TNFD’s work does not include those who most depend on nature or face the greatest risk of defending it.
May 2021: The Global Environmental Facility approves USD$1.7 million in 42-month funding to WWF-US to set up TNFD. Notably the Stakeholder Engagement Plan has little inclusion of NGOs and CSOs. In its risk assessment and mitigation it omits mention of important risks. This includes the risk of writing TNFD before a landmark new international global biodiversity framework is agreed (i.e. linked to the Convention on Biological Diversity, this aims to be the biodiversity equivalent to the Paris Agreement on climate); that TNFD may undermine existing corporate norms and expectations; or co-optation risks of a business-controlled decision making process. The documents also state that concerns regarding TNFD can be made via a WWF grievance mechanism but no mention has been made privately or publicly by TNFD to this mechanism. The gender action plan covers staffing and appointments, but has no plan for engaging women land defenders or organizations working on gender and nature issues.
Co-financing mentioned in project documents include a $400,000 grant by UNDP, as well as $100,000 in-kind. In early 2020, the European Forest Institute had also awarded a EUR 250,000 24-month tender to Global Canopy to work on TNFD. Other funders have also contributed to TNFD. They are listed here. It is not clear if this funding is contingent on any requirements of fair and equal inclusion of diverse stakeholders.
February 2021: The Dasgupta Review on the Economics of Biodiversity is published. It identifies the key role that the financial system plays in driving the biodiversity crisis.
January 2021: A Global Witness blog, Why climate risk reporting will not stop the finance industry bankrolling deforestation, outlines key reasons why climate-risk reporting (particularly under the TCFD, finalized in 2017) has failed on deforestation. It notes that the proposed TNFD approach is replicating these mistakes.
December 2020: BankTrack issues a report examining key lessons learned of why the Banking Environment Initiative Soft Commodities Compact failed to meet ‘zero net deforestation’ over its six-year lifespan. This was one of the first joint finance and nature initiatives and several of the non-business groups involved in setting up the Compact are now involved in TNFD.
August 2020 – University College London academics publish a paper on Managing nature-related financial risks: a precautionary policy approach for central banks and financial supervisors. The paper outlines why nature-related risks cannot be sufficiently managed by information disclosure and quantitative risk estimates.
July 2020: Efforts to bring together a Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures is announced. The Informal Working Group that will set up TNFD does not include rights holders or Global South civil society organizations beyond a narrow band of environmental data experts from NGOs and UN agencies. It also involves senior staff from several companies who face serious concerns related to their own environmental and human rights outcomes. It does not develop a due process protocol (unlike EFRAG or GSSB) or co-design process (see TIFD).[viii]
January 2020: The world’s first Covid-19 lockdown begins in Wuhan, China. The global pandemic contributes to raising the alarm about the links between nature loss and the spread of zoonotic diseases. Some scientists estimate the economic costs of inaction to be 100 times greater than the costs of prevention.
As of January 2022, the International Monetary Fund estimates that Covid-19 will cost the world economy $13.8 trillion by 2024.