Banks and financial institutions view sustainable agriculture as their route to investment in nature and biodiversity.
This was one of the key points delivered by Dr. Nicola Ranger, courtesy of her 2025 George Scott Robertson Memorial Lecture held recently at Queen’s University Belfast.
The University of Oxford academic went on to point out that consumers want financial institutions to further invest in nature, the environment and biodiversity.
And momentum is growing in this regard with a selection of the major investment bodies now starting to assess the issue of ‘risk’ within the natural world and how to best manage this on a sustainable basis.
According to Dr. Ranger, $7 trillion of annual investment taking place around the world has a negative impact on natural systems.
In contrast, only $200 billion worth of investment is focused on the retention and enhancement of the environment, biodiversity and natural systems.
Getting this investment balance changed will require the implementation of a strategy, which has three core elements.
These are: Direct communication with the 250 privately-owned companies driving the aforementioned $7 trillion investment programmes; getting governments to act, either through enhanced regulations or the introduction of incentives; and creating community focused investment projects.
Future investment
But it’s not all bad news, where investment in the development of sustainable systems is concerned. Energy is a case in point.
Dr. Ranger pointed to the significant investment that has taken in place in renewable electricity generation over the past 20 years.
She attributed this achievement to the development of new technologies, which have become cheaper to implement in line with a reduction in manufacturing and development costs. And this process will continue.
Northern Ireland’s agriculture minister, Andrew Muir, attended the lecture. He confirmed that protecting nature will be at the heart of his future farm support policies.
He also foresees a future where the public and private sectors will work together in achieving this objective.
But this approach, he declared, only works if private companies genuinely commit to sustainable business systems; green washing will not be tolerated.
Courtesy of her closing remarks, Dr. Ranger indicated that financial institutions are becoming more aware of the financial risks associated with changes within nature that can impact on the world’s economy.
And they want to invest in ways that minimise this risk. The challenge now is that of finding the way to make this happen in the most effective way possible.
And all of this comes back to one fundamental fact – if nature continues to be eroded then the potential for crops to be pollinated by birds and insects comes under ever greater threat.
