‘Biodiversity is all the different kinds of life you’ll find in one area—the variety of animals, plants, fungi, and even microorganisms like bacteria that make up our natural world. Each of these species and organisms work together in ecosystems, like an intricate web, to maintain balance and support life. Biodiversity supports everything in nature that we need to survive food, clean water, medicine, and shelter.’ (Definition WWF)

Last Friday, ULI and PWC jointly hosted a session on biodiversity and real estate. The workshop took place in one of PWC’s brainstorm rooms. After a short introduction from all participants, Naturalis Biodiversity Center talked about the essence of biodiversity and what happens if the ecosystem gets disrupted.

The group was split into two smaller groups. One group focussed on existing stock and the other group kept themselves busy with development projects. To get a focused discussion both groups were asked to come up with a realistic ambition and to define what contribution the property can make to avoiding disruption and/or help to rebalance the ecosystem.

From the discussion it became clear that both groups felt that the topic of biodiversity needed to be included in the development and investment plans as soon as possible because the property industry can have a positive impact on maintaining and/or restoring the right biodiversity climate. To achieve this the following steps, need to be set:

🌱 Create awareness and recognition of the topic amongst stakeholders in de industry (sense of urgency).

🌱 Drive a mindset change: paying attention to biodiversity is not an additional cost but an opportunity to create an additional return.

🌱 Include biodiversity as a topic in development and investment plans going forward.

Since time was limited, everybody committed to a follow-up session somewhere soon, for which also other stakeholders will be invited who are key to getting the right discussion and impact. The plan for the short term is to focus on the first point and organize a workshop, including internationally certifying bodies like BREEAM-NL and LEED to:

🌍 Create a sense of urgency around biodiversity as an extremely important topic for the real estate industry.

🌍 Start developing a taxonomy to make everybody in- and outside the industry communicate in the same language.

🌍 Start creating a biodiversity ‘toolkit’ for both development projects as well as standing investments to measure impact and return.

All in all a very insightful event for all participants with a realistic outcome and calling for action.

Thanks again to PWC for co-hosting and all participants for their lively participation.