The TNFD Mission and the LEAP Approach

The Working Group's stated mission is to develop and provide a risk management and disclosure framework for organizations to report and act on evolving nature-related risks., with the ultimate goal of supporting a shift in global financial flows away from environments with negative outcomes and towards positive outcomes for nature.

A LEAP assessment works with knowledgeable partners and providers of existing relevant frameworks to develop an integrated approach to assessing nature-related issues.. It is designed for use by organizations of all sizes and across all industries and geographies. This integrated assessment approach is called the LEAP approach, ou ‘LEAP’ whose translation means something like (To locate, To assess, Measure and Prepare)

Mission, principles and objectives

The TNFD framework was developed based on seven principles:

• Usability in the market: directly usable and valuable to market participants, especially companies and financial institutions, as well as politicians and other stakeholders;

• Based on science: follows a scientifically anchored approach model, incorporating well-established resources and emerging and converging scientific evidence into other existing science-based initiatives;

• Nature-related risks: encompasses nature-related risks that include immediate financial and material risks, as well as impacts of nature and its related organizational and social risks;

• Purpose-driven: actively reducing risks and increasing positive action for nature using the required minimum level of granularity to ensure achievement of the TNFD objective;

• Integrated and adaptive: Can be integrated with and enhance existing disclosures and other standards. Take into account being adaptable to changes in the national situation and international political commitments, market standards and conditions;

• Climate-nature nexus: employ an integrated approach to climate and nature-related risks, scaling increase funding for nature-based solutions; e

• Globally inclusive: Ensure relevant and accessible structure and approach across the world, in emerging and developed markets.

When developing the framework, The Working Group aimed to:

• Promote alignment between disclosure regimes;

• Consider users' perspectives and concerns of preparers of financial disclosures related to the nature;

• Create a structure that can be efficiently implemented by organizations in their financial communications.

TNFD Publications

Scope of a LEAP Assessment

Because

Internal due diligence processes like LEAP require support from an internal senior management champion (a committee or individual) and a dedicated team and project. Early alignment between management and the LEAP assessment team on the scope of resources to be committed to the assessment is vital before any in-depth analytical work begins.

What

The TNFD recommends that management and project teams develop and agree to simple terms of reference document describing the agreed parameters of the LEAP assessment to be carried out. This will help ensure alignment on goals and expected outcomes and timelines, and consequent resources and budget requirements. This assessment should be based:

• A quick, high-level preliminary check of internal data and external data and reference sources to generate a hypothesis about the organization's potential: impacts, risks and opportunities; e

• A determination of where likely skills and data gaps are and how these gaps will be addressed to successfully complete the scoped assessment.

The key to effective scoping is not to invest too much time or resources in any initial research and data scanning as the scoping process is designed only to define the parameters of the assessment to follow.. Some pilot organizations found it easy to be drawn into detailed analysis in the scoping phase, which increases the risks of anticipating the assessment itself.

Guide Questions

TNFD recommends that all organizations consider two high-level guiding questions to help ensure alignment on goals and expected outcomes of a LEAP Assessment.

1. Generate a working hypothesis: What are the organization's business processes and activities where there are likely to be problems related to a material nature?: impacts, risks and opportunities?

2. Align goals and resources: Given the current level of capacity, skills and data within the organization and certain organizational objectives, what are the resources (financial, human and data) necessary and agreed considerations and time allocations in carrying out an assessment?

Generate a working hypothesis

Which activities of a material nature are the organization most likely to have impacts on?, risks and opportunities?

Supporting questions:

• The organization (and the evaluation team) has a fundamental understanding of what is related to impacts, risks and opportunities?

• Which activities and/or assets are in the organization's assets upstream and downstream value chains?

• In which sectors, value chains and/or geographies the organization is present?

• How much revenue, expense or income is associated with each of these activities and assets? By sector, value chain and/or geography?

Alignment of goals and resources

Considering the current level of capacity, skills and data within the organization and considering organizational objectives, what are the resources (financial, human and data) and necessary and agreed time allocations to carry out an assessment?

Supporting questions:

• What are the organization's objectives and expectations resulting from a LEAP assessment?

• What is the organization’s approach to materiality? Who are the key players in aligning TNFD corporate reporting and what information will be material to them?

• What level of assessment is feasible or appropriate at this time, given the complexity of the organization's value chain? Must be by product, process, input, business unit or website?

• What are the baselines and time periods for analysis?

• What are the current limitations and/or restrictions of the assessment? For example, skills, Dice, finance resources; e

• Where it is appropriate to place boundaries around an analysis? What are the relevant businesses? Activities, sectors, geographies and biomes?

Perspectives of the TNFD

The TNFD proposal comes with the prospect of complementing companies' environmental reports to the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) within the ESG scope (Environmental, Social, and Governance) and directly addresses the impact of business activities on the environment.

Demonstrate transparency in their environmental actions, which can strengthen stakeholder trust and improve corporate reputation.
Identify and manage climate-related risks, such as exposure to extreme weather events and regulatory changes.
Discover business opportunities in emerging markets, such as carbon credits, especially through the Clean Development Mechanism (from that).
Adapt your business models for a low-carbon economy, aligning climate responsibility with financial performance.
Contribute to the development of more sustainable corporate and government policies, positively influencing environmental legislation.

Furthermore, is an indication that the company is committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions (GEE) and with the implementation of strategies to combat climate change. This is evidenced by the use of methodologies such as GHG Protocol to account and carry out GHG inventories.

See more in official publications:

https://tnfd.global/tnfd-publications