The business case for investing in biodiversity data

Fevziye Hasan , Jakob Nyström, Per Alström, Carina Andersson, Louise A. Ashton, David M. Baker, Michael J. W. Boyle, André P da Silva, Mats Eriksson, Robert Goodsell, Emma Granqvist , Alice C. Hughes , Alice Högström, Veronika A Johansson, Olga V Pettersson, Fabian Roger, Fredrik Ronquist, Tomas Roslin

Biodiversity loss threatens ecosystems and economic stability, creating an urgent need for biodiversity data. Businesses require these data to understand their impacts and dependencies, assess risks and opportunities, meet regulations, and inform nature-based solutions (NbS). Significant challenges remain: the biodiversity data gap, limited expertise in translating raw data into business use cases, and insufficient financing for consolidating data within a reliable open infrastructure like the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF). Here, we explore biodiversity data origins and how targeted investment, AI, and automation can address the biodiversity data gap faster, cheaper, and more reliably at scale. We propose a financing model for businesses to invest in biodiversity data, embedded within a broader framework addressing the data gap, with case studies illustrating practical application.