Consultation On Draft Natural Protocol Launched

Today offers the opportunity to see for the first time the draft Natural Capital Protocol and Sector Guides as they are launched for consultation at the World Forum on Natural Capital. The draft Protocol and Sector Guides have been developed by the Natural Capital Coalition as a standardized framework for business to measure and value its impacts and dependencies on natural capital and to help them integrate this into their decision making.

The Natural Capital Coalition is built upon the belief that through collaboration we will go further.

The consultation is therefore an essential part of the development process. As well as engaging with the growing Coalition membership, which has doubled in the last six months and now stands at 168 organisations, the Coalition is establishing an expert review panel, to lead the consultation, build consensus and gain market momentum. The consultation compliments the existing business pilot program that is already underway and includes over 50 companies representing all geographies and many major sectors.

The consultation will run until the 26 February 2016 and will be followed by several months of further development prior to the launch of Version 1 in July 2016.

Mark Gough, Executive Director of the Natural Capital Coalition said: ‘It is great to now be able to share the draft Protocol and Sector Guides after such an invigorating writing period with a wide range of people. We are looking forward to the extending the collaboration to our members and others interested in the improvements that are possible through an understanding of Natural Capital”

Eva Zabey, Director, Redefining Value – Natural Capital, WBCSD said: “Companies should compete on performance, not on methodology. WBCSD and its partners are proud and excited to have developed this open-source draft Protocol, on behalf of the Coalition, which we anticipate will become the world’s first standardized approach for business to measure and value their natural capital impacts and dependencies. It lays the critical foundations for, and will be instrumental in, driving business decision-making and higher sustainability performance around the world.”

Richard Mattison, Chief Executive, Trucost said: “We are excited to be part of the launch of the consultation via our work on the Sector Guides and with a number of companies piloting the Protocol. The consultation period offers a great opportunity for companies and other stakeholders to understand how applications of the Protocol can drive better decision making. We are looking forward to continuing the collaboration.”

To learn more about the Consultation and take part visit www.naturalcapitalcoalition.org/consultation.