Biodiversity is fast-becoming a new focus of attention by pension fund investors. In this session Nathalie Borgeaud of the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) explained what is happening with nature and why we need to focus on biodiversity when considering an investment approach. She explained the risk and disclosure framework underpinning TNFD, and why this integrated approach to incorporating nature-related risk and opportunity analysis into the corporate and financial decision making is so important.  

Nathalie then discussed what the framework is looking to achieve and where it is heading.  

Q&A followed moderated by Karen Shackleton of Pensions for Purpose. We then moved to breakout rooms of mixed stakeholders, led by our sponsors Redington and Invesco, to discuss the following questions:

1. What benefits are there to pension funds and asset managers to develop and disclose a nature strategy alongside their climate strategy?
2. How might pension funds and asset managers prepare for, and support, a shift in global financial flows away from nature-negative outcomes towards nature-positive outcomes? 
   
3. What sort of impact investment opportunities supporting biodiversity would pension funds like to see, and what ideas do other forum members have?  

In the usual way, we then regrouped and our sponsors shared some of the insights from the breakout room discussions before Nathalie Borgeaud wrapped the session up. 

Who was this event for?

Anyone involved in the governance or management of pension fund assets or other pools of assets and climate experts. For example, trustees of corporate defined benefit and defined contribution pension plans; LGPS pensions managers and committee members, in-house pension teams, legal, actuarial and investment advisers, asset managers, other investment service providers and climate-research groups.  

Agenda

The agenda for this online interactive discussion was as follows:  

• Welcome from Pensions for Purpose and housekeeping. 
  
• Keynote presentation from Nathalie Borgeaud, Lead, Financial Markets Stakeholder Engagement, Taskforce on Nature-Related Financial Disclosures (TNFD)  
  
• Questions. 
  
• Mixed breakout rooms moderated by our forum sponsors, Invesco and Redington, to discuss key questions. 
  
• Return to main meeting – sharing of key insights.  

Speaker biographies

Prior to joining TNFD in February 2022, Nathalie worked for a start-up, now a Moody’s subsidiary, promoting data on physical climate risk and nature loss among European financial institutions. Before that, she worked as senior co-director for Corporate Social Responsibility at BNP Paribas CIB. She designed and implemented a sustainable development strategy, which included monitoring Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) risks and developing green financial product offerings. She built her finance career negotiating large complex financings for corporate clients with BNP Paribas and JPMorgan Chase for about  12 years. Initially based in New York with Citi, she originated project finance, bonds and equity issues for large industrial projects key to the development of emerging countries. 

Nathalie is an ingénieur of the French Grande Ecole Mines-ParisTech. She also holds an MBA from HEC Paris and a landscape architect degree from Ecole du Paysage de Versailles

The Paris Alignment Forum

The Paris Alignment Forum was established by Pensions for Purpose to help pension funds and other asset owners on their journey towards alignment with the goals of the Paris Agreement. We do this by sharing climate-related thought leadership written by our Influencer members (asset managers, consultants and lawyers), by running free training workshops for trustees and by engaging in industry-wide conversation through our quarterly all-stakeholder and asset-owner events. Find out more. The Forum is sponsored by Invesco and Redington. 

To become a Paris Alignment Forum member or to find out more about sponsorship opportunities and Influencer membership please email Karen Shackleton 

Pensions for Purpose

Pensions for Purpose exists as a bridge between asset managers, pension funds and their professional advisers, to encourage the flow of capital towards impact investment. Our aim is to empower pension funds to seek positive impact opportunities and mitigate negative impact risks. For more information please email Charlotte O'Leary.