Every item around you is somehow a product of the biological diversity on earth, and human life is entirely dependent on this biodiversity for food, shelter, and medicine.  Biodiversity is also the base that underlies all of the ecosystems that provide us with clean air and water, a regulated climate and other critical ecosystem services.

We often forget that business is equally and entirely dependent on ecosystem services.  Without a secure water supply, we can’t make paper or machinery, or effectively remove precious minerals and metals.  Without the erosion and flood control delivered by intact forests and wetlands, agricultural and urban areas would be inundated.  All industrial production, commerce and trade ultimately rely on the raw materials and ecosystem services made possible by biodiversity.

The financial importance of these ecosystem services is hard to overstate.  If humans had to pay for the ecosystem services we currently enjoy for free, by a conservative estimate it would cost us $33 trillion annually – almost twice the global GDP, and none of it directed at the sectors we currently fund.  However, the biodiversity that supports all ecosystem services is increasingly at risk, and as a result the healthy functioning of ecosystems is being compromised.

Because businesses are so dependent on biodiversity and ecosystem services, any interruption in these services or decline in their quality constitutes an acute business risk.  Companies need to plan proactively to ensure that their access to land, supplies, markets, and capital can persist indefinitely without a decline in their resource base, or in the social welfare it delivers.

As part of our expertise and investment in sustainability strategies, ÉEM Inc. offers services in biodiversity assessments and ecosystem services analysis. This expertise enables ÉEM Inc to provide an integrated and comprehensive suite of sustainability services.  Biodiversity-related services include:

•    Biodiversity policy and strategic action plans, including analysis of risks and opportunities related to biodiversity
•    Biodiversity conservation performance analyses
•    Ecosystem service review - analysis of a company’s dependency on raw materials and services and technologies from natural systems, and resiliency to changes in ecosystem goods and services
•    Strategic advice on conventions, regulations, legislation, & certification pertaining to biodiversity conservation and protected areas
•    Conservation and protected area planning
•    Species-at-risk assessments
•    Conservation footprint analysis

These services complement and enhance ÉEM Inc.’s existing services in strategic sustainability planning, environmental management, sustainability awareness and capacity building and stakeholder engagement.