7 November 2012: The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB) for Business Coalition Headquarters has been launched in Singapore. The Coalition aims to shift corporate behaviour to preserve and enhance the Earth’s natural capital.

According to the Coalition, it will bring together global stakeholders to study and standardize methods for natural capital accounting to enable its valuation and reporting in business. In response to the launch, Achim Steiner, UN Environment Programme (UNEP) Executive Director, underscored the importance of the Coalition to integrating “the valuation of natural capital into business practices in the vital private sector.”

Reflecting on the launch of the coalition, Pavan Sukhdev, Study Leader of TEEB and UNEP Goodwill Ambassador, stressed that “the invisibility of corporate externalities is a root cause of many errors of judgement across economics, ecology and governance,” and that the Coalition provided an opportunity to address this challenge.

Founding members of the Coalition include: The Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (ICAEW); HRH The Prince of Wales’s Accounting for Sustainability Project; the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN); WWF-UK; the Economic Development Board of Singapore; the Global Reporting Initiative and Conservation International. [TEEB For Business Website]