Nature and Biodiversity
Identify and measure portfolio impacts and nature dependencies
Biodiversity is rapidly declining, and its loss has become a material risk to businesses and investors. Our tools help measure its financial impact and manage associated risks. They go beyond standard metrics, allowing investors to analyze company operations at the asset level and assess how biodiversity risks may affect revenue, using consistent data across nature-related and physical risk metrics. Our tools are intended to support businesses as they align with evolving biodiversity disclosure regulation standards, including the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) and the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD).
Portfolio assessment and disclosure
We support clients trying to meet TNFD or CSRD reporting requirements using the four-step integrated assessment framework, LEAP, which stands for locate, evaluate, assess and prepare.
We can help you identify assets that are contributing to deforestation and corporate operations located in deforestation areas, as well as measure a company’s total biodiversity footprint.
We help investors better understand how biodiversity risk may affect revenue by linking asset-level risks to issuer insights. Built on aggregated data from WWF’s Biodiversity Risk Filter and MSCI Geospatial Asset Intelligence.
We offer solutions to help you integrate our climate and environmental risk data in response to the European Central Bank’s plan to require disclosure of nature-related risks alongside climate-related risks.
A material risk to businesses
Economic risk from biodiversity loss can emerge at the asset, company or portfolio level. Biodiversity and climate change are inextricably linked, with biodiversity loss reducing nature's ability to absorb greenhouse gases.
$5 trillion
Of global economic damages could be caused by biodiversity loss and environmental degradation over five years1
75%
Of Earth’s land surface has been altered by human activities2
29%
Of existing animal and plant species are at critical risk of extinction3
Map of assets in biodiversity-sensitive areas
GeoSpatial Asset Intelligence now integrates data from our partnership with WWF, featuring their Biodiversity Risk Filter (BRF) metrics. Investors can assess nature-related risks across ~3 million asset locations by combining these insights with biodiversity-sensitive area and Mean Species Abundance (MSA)-based metrics. All within an interactive, filterable geospatial visualization.
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Source: MSCI Sustainability and Climate, as of May 2025.
Helping you manage risk and identify opportunity
Unlock deeper layers of insight from your portfolio or loan book to individual asset locations — whether a mining location, manufacturing site or regional office — with nature and biodiversity metrics available at the asset level and further consolidated at the issuer level.
Our nature and biodiversity metrics combine asset-level insights with issuer-level aggregation, designed to help you select appropriate metrics based on scope, objectives and disclosure requirements.
We use granular data for a bottom-up approach, offering the ability to quantify the impact of investments on biodiversity across sectors.
We have spent decades developing metrics and data for global investors to measure climate- and sustainability-related risks and opportunities — and we have applied that experience to our nature and biodiversity solutions.
A granular view of nature exposures
Get extensive coverage across companies and asset locations with consistent data for both nature-related and physical risk metrics.
700,000
Public and private companies covered, with detailed, continuously expanding location-based data4
3 million+
Asset locations that can be expanded upon request, covered by our Geospatial Asset Intelligence5
180+
Data points across impact on nature, nature risks and opportunities included in our Nature and Biodiversity Metrics issuer-level data package6
Discover MSCI’s Nature and Biodiversity Framework
Source: MSCI Sustainability and Climate, as of Dec. 2023
Featured solutions
GeoSpatial Asset Intelligence
Drill-down insights into location-specific physical and nature-related risks.
Climate solutions
MSCI can help you understand, monitor and manage the risk and return of climate exposures with our integrated data, analytical tools, indexes and research insights.
Physical risk solutions
Analytical tools and data from MSCI designed to support investors and banks in assessing and managing physical risk.
Looking for a demo?
Research and resources
Investor guide: Biodiversity risks and impacts
Identify which questions to ask and which metrics to consider as you incorporate biodiversity into your investment process.
From Awareness to Action: Sector-Based Biodiversity Risk in Investments
Biodiversity decline isn’t just environmental — it’s financial. Identifying biodiversity-loss drivers helps investors strengthen resilience and start to unlock upside in a nature-positive transition.
Concentration Trends in the Nature-Based Carbon Market
Who’s driving the nature-based carbon market? Learn how a small group of companies in the MSCI ACWI IMI Index account for most activity — and what it reveals about climate and nature leadership.
How Vancity Investment Management integrates biodiversity insights into investment strategies
Climate solutions
Use our integrated data, analytics, indexes and research-led insights to identify opportunities, sharpen your view of climate-related financial risk, and find your competitive edge.
1 University of Oxford, Dec. 2023. “The Green Scorpion: the Macro-Criticality of Nature for Finance.”
2 Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). 2019. "The Global Assessment Report on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services.”
3 https://www.theworldcounts.com/challenges/planet-earth/forests-and-deserts/species-extinction-rate
4 Source: MSCI Sustainability and Climate, as of June 27, 2024.
5 Source: MSCI Sustainability and Climate, as of April 2, 2025.
6 Source: MSCI Sustainability and Climate, as of June 2024.