Framing Guidance.pdf

This guidance explains why biodiversity requires additional consideration in natural capital assessments, as all businesses impact and depend on biodiversity, leading to costs and benefits. Natural capital refers to the stock of renewable and non-renewable natural resources that generate benefits to people, while biodiversity is the variety within and between living parts of this stock. Higher levels of biodiversity generate more goods and services, and greater resilience to change. Integrating biodiversity values into natural capital assessments helps identify risks and opportunities, and failing to consider biodiversity can lead to underappreciated impacts and dependencies. The guidance provides a framework for conducting natural capital assessments that incorporate biodiversity, including familiarizing oneself with basic concepts, applying them to business context, and preparing for assessment. Biodiversity underpins the goods and services generated by natural capital stocks, and its decline can have significant impacts on businesses and society.