Extreme weather, drought, flooding, disease, social disruption and environmental refugees – hardly sounds like a recipe for a thriving business environment does it? Climate change is threatening to undercut the foundations of healthy economies – making it not only an environmental problem, but a business one too.
Push towards legislation
In late May 2018, two-thirds of G20 member states - accounting for 85% of the global economy - begun to implement these recommendations. The Taskforce’s recommendations promote voluntary, consistent climate-related financial disclosures. However, as companies are facing increasing pressure from investors and shareholders, mandatory implementation of the TCFD recommendations might not be far away.
TCFD and EPRA go hand in hand
TCFD is innovative and collaborative, making it easier for organisations to report and derive business value. The Taskforce has sought to align its recommendations with existing reporting standards and benchmarks such as CDP, GHG Protocol, GRESB, GRI, IIGCC, IPIECA and the SASB. Importantly, organizations already reporting climate-related information under other frameworks will be able to disclose under TCFD immediately and are strongly encouraged to do so.
The risks are real – and so are the opportunities
While the transition to low-carbon energy is under way, there is still a long way to go to decarbonize the world economy. It is likely that even with the best of efforts, companies will experience some disruption from unavoidable climate change– and many have yet to wake up to the reality of this threat. Equally, many companies are unaware of the opportunities to create long term value and out perform their competitors by integrating climate change related impacts into their decision making. Forward-thinking companies are therefore realising that clear and tangible action on climate change is now essential to their long-term resilience and the TCFD framework provides the perfect starting point for businesses to achieve this change.