GSS EU Science Funding Gateway

The successful proposal should develop, take up or demonstrate in real settings standardised natural capital accounting practices to support companies to measure, value and synthetise biodiversity and ecosystem risks assessment, notably in a way that is suitable for routine consideration in business and economy decision-making. It should also mainstream environmental footprints methods for instance through quantifying the environmental impacts of products, or supply and value chains, business models or organisations based the Commission Organisation Environmental Footprint (OEF) and the Product Environmental Footprint (PEF).

The successful proposal should contribute to the alignment of natural capital accounting between the public and private sectors and to explore how the links to link the collection and use of statistics and data for natural capital accounting. It should also address the obstacles businesses are facing, in particular on data collection and improving the access and utility of European environmental data sets at different levels (i.e.: national statistical offices, environmental agencies, corporate reports) allowing better corporate and national data integration for economic and financial decision making.  It should also address the specific decision-making needs of corporates and financial service provider to allow a specific and meaningful linkage with the macro-economic perspective and the ecological concept of planetary boundaries at the scale of decision to be taken at corporate level enabling to assess and understand to corporate safe operating space. The successful proposal should explore to which extent the System of Environmental-Economic Accounting / Experimental Ecosystem Accounting (SEEA EEA) framework in its current form is useful for natural capital assessment and natural capital accounting by businesses.

The proposal should ensure that the EU continues to play a lead role in international environmental affairs through its support for effective measures, international standards and accounting relating to natural capital. The successful proposal should improve the access and utility of European environmental data sets at different levels allowing better corporate and national data integration for economic and financial decision making. The successful proposal should support developing and testing natural capital and biodiversity based business models. The successful proposal should help making natural capital and biodiversity based business models bankable, thereby enabling private investments in nature conservation.