Asia and the Pacific’s critical economic infrastructure, nature itself, is slipping into terminal decline. And the cost of inaction is only rising. To ensure a robust response from policy makers and business leaders alike, we must redefine how we think and talk about nature and treat it for what it is: the planet’s most valuable asset class, the very foundation of  economic resilience and competitiveness.

Despite growing acknowledgment of nature’s power to address an array of sustainable development challenges, we are burning through our natural capital at an alarming rate. According to the new report by the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), natural capital has fallen by nearly 40% worldwide. The report, Assessment on Business and Biodiversity, published in February notes that, “This situation creates pervasive systemic risk affecting the stability of the financial system and the global economy.”

Nowhere are these pressures accelerating faster than across Asia and the Pacific. Regionally, there has been a 60% decline of wildlife populations since 1970, and a quarter of its endemic species are currently at risk of extinction. Nearly 60% of the region’s grasslands are degraded, and 45% of Asia Pacific wetlands have been lost. 

These statistics are alarming both economists and environmentalists alike. According to the authors of the Asia Development Bank’s 2025 Climate Report: Unlocking Nature for Development, “when ecosystems degrade, economies face higher health and disaster costs, reduced productivity, shrinking fiscal revenues, and weakened debt sustainability.” The ADB’s Chief Economist has warned, “countries that fail to invest in nature are effectively divesting from their own competitiveness.”  

In fact, the ADB study shows a staggering 75% of developing Asia’s GDP is dependent on the ecosystem services that nature provides.⁷ Critically, clean water is becoming less abundant in countries like India, Pakistan and Viet Nam, crimping the growth and resilience of agriculture, fisheries and forestry. Clean water is also curtailing plans for data center expansion too, and more traditional forms of manufacturing, such as textiles. Important freshwater resources like Tonle Sap Lake in Cambodia have reportedly seen an 87% drop in fish. Along the coast, the picture is no better where local fishers report a 50% decline in income.   

Language that resonates 

Business enterprises and financial firms in the region must wake up to the risks related to nature loss if we are to shore up economic resilience and security.  The IPBES report also notes that, “because businesses are highly influential and can move quickly when motivated, informed and enabled to do so, they can be agents of positive change.”  

But convincing business leaders to act is its own challenge. Business professionals have sometimes held nature advocates at arm’s length, equating their advocacy with endless impact assessments and other regulatory constraints. Some activists fail to understand or accurately assess business risks, consumer expectations, and other challenges of working in hyper-competitive markets. Furthermore, “much of the relevant scientific literature is not written for a business audience,” write the authors of the IPBES report.  

As the host of the UNDP’s podcast, The Nature Pledge: Biodiversity and Sustainability in Asia and the Pacific, I enjoy many conversations with leading voices on the economic implications of biodiversity loss. Importantly, several of our guests have suggested that we adjust the way we speak about nature to increase business commitments, and to enhance the relevance of nature to policy makers, especially in economic planning. In this regard, UNDP’s Nature Pledge provides a helpful lens and guide.  

UNDP’s Nature Pledge is our organization’s corporate commitment to support countries in meeting their ambitions under the Kunming Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) and an array of other multilateral agreements driving sustainable development. The Nature Pledge also offers a pathway for transforming our approach to nature, calling for a shift in values and behaviors towards nature, a shift in how we finance economic growth, and a shift in how we leverage nature for sustainable development. 

The first of these shifts – the value shift – calls for a deeper appreciation for nature’s contribution to our economies and human development.  Specially, it calls on us to “challenge and disrupt the false dichotomy between environmental and economic interests,” and to reject the outdated understanding that environmental protection comes at the expense of economic goals.  

On our Nature Pledge podcast, a variety of guest speakers have argued that to encourage a new narrative on nature, we need to simplify our rhetoric and target business interests directly. For example, Eva Zabey, CEO of Business for Nature, explains that, we have made “[environmental] sustainability overly complex and not relatable,” and that, “We've used language that was beyond the reach of understanding of some people.”  

Instead, she advises that we:  

“Talk about the real impact on people's health, the real costs of cleanup. Talk about how the hydropower reservoir is not being as efficient as it should be because the forest upstream has been cut down and it's causing sedimentation. Talk about the fact that we're losing natural pollinators, and that's a risk for our food security.” 

In short, nature will be valued in business and financial decision-making when we can articulate a strong business case. Among other words of advice from our other guest speakers include the following: 

1. Boards respond to risk, not guilt: Telling directors and CEOs that they have a moral obligation to "save the orangutan" doesn't work. Telling them “your water supply will run out in 3 years, shutting down your factory" does. Where appropriate, we need to articulate nature as a material business risk. 
2. Describe nature as infrastructure: Stop painting nature as "scenery" and demonstrate how it serves as "infrastructure." Just as you wouldn't let a bridge collapse, you cannot let a mountainside, riverbank or sea-coast degrade if industries are dependent on sound flood management. 
3. Point out the role of innovations and solutions: There needs to be a point of engagement so that all people can contribute and this implies a focus on solutions. Language that empowers people from all walks of life to make sound decisions based on innovative, people-centric approaches is particularly powerful.   

As noted by UNDP’s Administrator, Alexander de Croo, “Awareness is now accelerating of the risks to development if biodiversity fails—and of the economic opportunities and future prosperity that emerge where it thrives.”  To ensure that business leaders convert that understanding into concrete action, speaking in plain language and defining nature as a critical economic asset will be required to address rapid rates of nature loss both in the region, and globally.