NAB has announced that it is increasing its recognition of the benefits of sustainable business practices, incorporating ‘natural values’ into the bank’s policies and procedures.

It says ““We’re making these investments because we know that farmers who effectively manage their natural capital assets, such as water, soil and energy resources, generally have a more robust and resilient business model. In the long term, they are seeing improved profitability as a result of reduced input costs and/or more consistent yields over time.”

In their Natural Value Strategy they say they are “recognising the impacts and dependencies of biodiversity and ecosystem services and accounting for them within traditional business frameworks.”

In Six Capitals Jane Gleeson-White explains that “ecological economists distinguish three different sorts of capital: natural capital, human (or cultural) capital and traditional manufactured capital. .. In accounting terms , natural capital is the stock, which yields a flow of ecosystem goods (such as fish, honey and trees) and services, such as atmospheric regulation , flood control, watcher catchment and purification, nutrient recycling, erosion control, waste processing and pollination”.

She says that natural capital (consisting of all renewable and non-renewable environmental resources and processes that provide goods and services that support the organisation’s past, present and future prosperity) is one of six capitals that should be accounted for, together with financial capital, manufactured capital, intellectual capital, human capital and social and relationship capital.