2018-生物多样性指标在商业中的发展与应用（英文版）-1mb

Summary of The Development and Use of Biodiversity Indicators in Business: An Overview

Core Content

This document provides an overview of the development and use of biodiversity indicators in the business context, emphasizing the need for a structured approach to selecting and creating indicators that align with diverse business applications. It is published by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) in collaboration with the Interdisciplinary Centre for Conservation Science (ICCS) at the University of Oxford. The report introduces a spectrum of biodiversity indicator applications, which helps businesses identify the most appropriate indicators for their specific needs.

The spectrum outlines four main scopes for biodiversity indicator use:

1. Scope A: Biodiversity management and performance at the individual site and landscape level
2. Scope B: Biodiversity management and performance at the cluster, business unit, corporate, or product level
3. Scope C: Biodiversity performance assessment at the corporate level
4. Scope D: Third-party biodiversity performance assessment

The report highlights that biodiversity indicators are not a one-size-fits-all solution and that different applications may require different types of indicators, depending on the context, objective, time frame, audience, frequency, and spatial scale of the assessment.

Main Views

• Biodiversity indicators are essential for businesses to understand and manage their impacts and dependencies on biodiversity.
• Businesses face internal and external drivers that motivate the use of biodiversity indicators, including regulatory compliance, certification, financial reporting, and sustainability goals.
• The development of biodiversity indicators is a complex task due to the variability in natural systems and the need for indicators that are both simple and relevant across different applications.
• The report introduces an overarching process for developing and using biodiversity indicators, which is similar to business decision-making frameworks and emphasizes the importance of initial scoping to define the purpose and scope of the indicator.
• The process encourages businesses to ask the right questions upfront and to seek existing indicators that can be adapted to their needs, rather than developing new ones from scratch.

Key Information

• The spectrum of biodiversity indicator applications helps businesses identify where and how to apply indicators.
• Scope A focuses on site-level assessments, such as evaluating the effectiveness of management interventions, and often involves site-specific measures of biodiversity state, pressure, and response.
• Scope B and C involve corporate-level assessments, where indicators are used to evaluate biodiversity performance across different business units and products.
• Scope D refers to third-party assessments, which are used for external reporting and compliance.
• Some existing biodiversity indicators and tools include:
  • UNEP-WCMC impact-focused biodiversity indicators for extractive companies
  • Global Biodiversity Score (GBS) for measuring a company's biodiversity footprint
  • Integrated Biodiversity Assessment Tool (IBAT) for site-level risk screening
  • Biodiversity Indicator and Reporting System (BIRS) for the cement and aggregates sector
  • Cool Farm Biodiversity Tool and Sustainable Tobacco Programme for product-level assessments
• The report emphasizes that corporate-level biodiversity state indicators are currently underdeveloped, and that their creation could improve the ability of businesses to report directly against international biodiversity goals such as the Aichi Biodiversity Targets and the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Conclusion

The report serves as a guide for businesses and practitioners seeking to integrate biodiversity considerations into their operations. It encourages the use of a spectrum-based approach to identify the most suitable indicators for different business contexts and recommends a structured process to ensure that indicators are both relevant and effective. The paper also calls for more research and development of indicators that can measure biodiversity at the corporate level, to support long-term sustainability and global biodiversity targets.

Key Definitions

• Indicator: A measure based on verifiable data that conveys information about more than itself. It is purpose-dependent, and its interpretation varies based on the business application.
• Biodiversity indicators can measure:
  • State (e.g., species abundance, ecosystem condition)
  • Pressures (e.g., threats to biodiversity)
  • Responses (e.g., mitigation actions taken by the business)
  • Benefits (e.g., ecosystem services)

Table of Business Applications