SEED is a joint venture from NatureFinance and the Crowther Lab at ETH in Zurich to advance the market adoption of the SEED biodiversity index.
Nature is increasingly being valued in global markets, as a dependency risk, a basis for a new generation of credit markets, as a driver of productivity and resilience, and as a basis for pricing ecosystem services and nature assets. For this to be a positive development for nature and its stewards, it is critical that there is a basis for scientifically robust measurement of nature, especially biodiversity.
SEED is creating the world’s first biodiversity assessment that can quantify the full extent of genetic, species, and ecosystem diversity and their variation through time, on a global scale. Developed by ecologists at ETH Zurich, the assessment draws on all available environmental data to provide a holistic measure of biological complexity (or “biocomplexity”), whilst continuously integrating emerging metrics that measure individual aspects of biodiversity. The use of this assessment can enable high-integrity valuation of biodiversity that can be used to underpin new financial and policy mechanisms geared towards a nature positive world.
NatureFinance is a Geneva-based, international not-for-profit dedicated to aligning global finance with equitable, nature positive outcomes, thereby contributing to efforts to address climate goals and a just transition to sustainable development. Its work includes initiatives to build and use biodiversity data to improve the management and mitigation of nature related risks and impacts, the development of purposeful nature markets, advancing financial innovations, strengthening nature related liabilities and citizen action on nature.
The SEED partnership will mobilise support to continue the development of the biodiversity index, engage with key initiatives advancing the valuation of nature in investment decisions and global markets, and presenting the value of the index to policy makers and market shapers. It will design, develop and execute a robust, sustainable, financially viable and impactful basis for bringing the SEED biodiversity index into use in global markets.
