Globally, there is increasing recognition of the importance of protecting and restoring nature in order to mitigate climate change impacts.
With this recognition, calls have risen for the development of systems to measure and value nature, enabling businesses, governments and investors to prioritise nature and the environment in decision-making. The ability to measure natural capital at the property level is critical to the development and operation of these systems and delivery of sustainability outcomes more broadly.
The Natural Capital Investment Initiative (NCII), led by Climateworks Australia and supported by NAB, was established to address two key priorities for measuring and valuing natural capital; the need for:
- Comparable measurement systems covering all key aspects of natural capital.
- Public and private incentives for land managers at all scales to regularly measure and report on natural capital.
In Phase 1 the NCII addressed these priorities through the development of an open-source Natural Capital Measurement Catalogue (NCMC), which outlines a comprehensive set of natural capital measures and metrics at the property level. In Phase 2, the initiative aims to test and pilot the NCMC through measurement and incentive programs across government, financial institutions, and food supply chains.
Phase 1 of the NCII delivered a number of key outcomes, including:
- An overarching framework for measuring natural capital at scale.
- A proof-of-concept Natural Capital Measurement Catalogue.
- Support from the NCII Advisory Group including endorsement of the NCMC and identified pilot opportunities.
This progress report presents these outcomes in more detail and outlines the next phase of the Initiative.