Leading up to Finextra’s annual green conference, Sustainable Finance Live, which will take place at Events@No6 on October 8 in London, keynote speaker and founder of ResponsibleRisk Richard Peers interviewed Robin Millington, CEO of Planet Tracker.
Planet Tracker is an organisation focused on addressing the environmental challenges facing the world at present, and in the discussion Millington outlined the need to take action and drive financial decision-making in the sustainability sector.
Planet Tracker manages and sorts available environmental data for corporations and businesses so that they can work towards their sustainable goals.
Millington cited how companies use the excuse that there is not enough data on environmental impact to drive action, however, this is not the case. She highlighted that there is an abundance of data available, though it is “not tied up in a neat bow” and companies are “waiting for perfection” rather than putting in the work to contextualise and analyse the data available.
Planet Tracker aims to help businesses see how climate change impacts the role of natural resources in their company. They can identify key environmental factors in your industry, what metrics you need to assess according to those factors, and how to consolidate those metrics.
Millington stated that Planet Tracker has been making progress by developing biodiversity bonds. They issued a reforestation natural bond that is targeted to restore natural resources in South America and is being used by the Uruguayan government.
While there is a great deal of concern around reducing carbon emissions and pushing towards Net Zero, which is crucial, Millington pointed out that there are other climate system issues which have not been addressed to the same extent. The threat to the wetlands, the ongoing water crises, and the damage that climate change could wreak on food systems is increasingly urgent.
She uses fish as an example, explaining that the fishing ecosystem is in danger as coastal areas are heating up thanks to global warming, and sea temperatures are the highest recorded in history. Fish is a primary protein for three billion people, and the loss of fish stocks will significantly impact the livelihoods of many people in regards to food, jobs, the economy, agriculturally, and financially.
Millington noted that an understated risk in the sustainability sector that is becoming more prevalent is litigation. Companies are becoming more liable for their actions, and growing litigation is a major risk as businesses make false or unsupportable sustainability claims. For these reasons, technology-enabled traceability when it comes to logging data for natural resources and tracking sustainable development should be implemented.
The theme of Sustainable Finance Live 2024 is biodiversity and natural capital, focusing heavily on the transaction journey of natural resources and the role of climate finance in the supply chain.
Millington highlighted that more action needs to be taking place on biodiversity, though she pointed out that ‘biodiversity’ may not be the best term:
“I don’t like the term ‘biodiversity’ because I do think it has the old meaning of being deconstructed down to plants species and animal species, and there are things in an ecosystem that are other than species-based. Water, for example, or air. I like to use the word ‘nature’. ‘Nature’ is everything and nothing.”
To learn more about Sustainable Finance Live 2024, check out the agenda and speakers here.