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Strengthening Understanding and Strategies of business To Assess and Integrate Nature

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - SUSTAIN (Strengthening Understanding and Strategies of business To Assess and Integrate Nature)

Reporting period: 2022-09-01 to 2024-02-29

SUSTAIN’s ambition is to facilitate transformative changes within the global economy to halt and reverse biodiversity loss. To deliver on this ambition, SUSTAIN will use a multi-disciplinary approach to expand and
further develop the existing knowledge base on business dependencies and impacts to drive better corporate and financial decision-making regarding biodiversity and ecosystem services, and reduce resulting financial risks.
SUSTAIN will support businesses through these different steps under three inter-linked work streams:
1. Development of tools, methods and knowledge products to support target actors.
2. Raising awareness among, and educating, target actors.
3. Engaging with and linking to the existing landscape of initiatives related to business, finance, and biodiversity
The key objectives are:
• To develop a database outlining the dependencies and impacts on biodiversity and ecosystem services of businesses which functions across all economic sectors and across the value chain;
• To develop methods that economic actors can implement to reduce biodiversity-related risks and increase opportunities, and identify suitable indicators to be used to monitor progress;
• To develop a toolbox to measure, assess and monitor the impacts and dependencies of business on biodiversity; and
• To promote business cases that contribute to the conservation, restoration and sustainable use of biodiversity and ecosystem services, and promote public accountability by informing regulatory agencies,
financial institutions, producers, retailers and consumers.
During the first 18 months of the project, project partners have been working in WP1 to finalize the update of the ENCORE knowledge base, outlining business impacts and dependencies on nature. As part of WP2 a Workshop in November was organised to determine the WP2 research direction. In the context of WP4 preparatory work was conducted on the delivery of case studies, a thought paper on change the rules, and conservation investment blueprints, all to be submitted in the next reporting period. Consortium partners collaborated in WP5 to submit the database of key stakeholders and drafted a dissemination and engagement plan. The Project Coordinator focused in WP6 on the project management of the project and delivered various milestones and deliverables to support WP6 delivery.
The updated ENCORE knowledge base will provide more granular, up-to-date, and science-based information to allow businesses, financial institutions, and regulators, to better identify their potential impacts and dependencies on nature. Rolling-out the updated knowledge base through collaboration with the ENCORE Partnership increases the potential of achieving a significant positive impact as the ENCORE tool already has an established reputation and user base.
Leading private sector frameworks, standards and coalitions for assessment and disclosure of nature-related risks, such as TNFD and SBTN have already started exploring how the updated ENCORE knowledge base developed through Work Package 1 could be integrated into their tools and guidance. The research team is also in touch with several research projects expected to leverage the updated database for further academic or industry analyses, including studies led by WEF, OECD, Finance for Biodiversity, and Nature Finance. While we do not yet have evidence of the updated ENCORE knowledge base improving understanding and awareness of how business depend, we have anecdotal evidence of interest in the updates from business, finance and regulators and positive feedback on the updates through the industry expert review.