ScienceNot yet confirmed elsewhere1 publisher2 min readPublished
Lund review finds 8 of 89 big companies in nature-intensive sectors report using biodiversity indicators
Lund University found that 8 of 89 large companies in the sectors that most affect biodiversity report using biodiversity indicators. Six of those eight rely on a single measure, a practice one author warns can protect one part of nature while damaging another.
The Scientist · Science desk
What happened
- The 89 companies came from food, beverages, tobacco, apparel, chemicals, construction, energy and mining, and the researchers worked from their sustainability reports.
- In a side-by-side comparison of four indicators, the team found the measures often differ on how important a given geographic area is for biodiversity.
- The authors set out seven recommendations, among them treating composite indicators as an initial screening tool and relying on individual indicators for important decisions.
- The study, by William Sidemo-Holm and colleagues, is published in the Journal of Cleaner Production under the title 'Biodiversity at risk when businesses rely on narrow indicators'.
Why it matters
- exposure Places in less species-rich ecosystems are the ones a global-only assessment tends to undervalue; the authors' call for ecoregion-level assessment is aimed at catching them.
- constraint Adding indicators narrows the blind spot without closing it, because genetic diversity, ecological connectivity, and plants, fungi and invertebrates are thinly covered by the indicators that exist.
- decision For the 81 companies in the sample that reported no indicator, the study argues for starting with several measures; adopting a single one would reproduce the blind spot the comparison exposed.
The 9% in the study's headline is eight companies out of 89 [1][16]. Count only the firms that reported more than one indicator and the share falls to about 2%, two out of 89 [17]. Both figures come from sustainability reports. They count companies that reported using indicators to inform decisions [2][3]. So the review measures disclosure. A firm could consult biodiversity data without saying so in a report, or name an indicator that changed none of its choices.
The comparison of indicators is the stronger half of the paper [5]. When the four measures disagree about a place, a company holding only one of them can conclude that the area matters little for biodiversity, even though it is highly valuable in ways that indicator does not capture [6]. "Different indicators measure different aspects of nature. Our results show that no single biodiversity indicator provides a complete picture. Companies that rely on only one indicator may therefore make decisions that protect one biodiversity value while damaging another," said William Sidemo Holm, one of the researchers behind the study [8].
His last sentence is an inference from the disagreement result, and a reasonable one. The phys.org account does not name the four indicators, say how often they diverged, or describe a real company decision that went wrong because it relied on one [5]. I think the advice holds without that case. A company screening sites with a single tool cannot see the values the other three would have flagged, and it has no internal check on how much it is missing [6].
The authors ask for redundancy at two levels. Companies should use several indicators to cover different aspects of nature [15]. Where possible, they should also use more than one indicator per aspect, to reduce bias from a particular data set or method [11]. "If companies want to understand and report their impact on biodiversity accurately, they need to use several indicators rather than a single measure. Indicators can play a crucial role in informing decisions that affect biodiversity, but there is still considerable room for improvement in how they are used today," Sidemo Holm said [14].
Another recommendation looks past current conditions. It asks companies to pair indicators with assessments of future human pressures, such as projected land-use change [13].
What to watch
- Whether the full Journal of Cleaner Production paper names the four indicators and quantifies how often they disagree on an area's importance.
- Whether a repeat review of the same 89 companies' sustainability reports shows the count of indicator users, or of multi-indicator users, moving from 8 and 2.
- Whether indicators for genetic diversity and ecological connectivity, which the authors call underrepresented, are developed and taken up by companies.
Clarity's read
What the record supports and how the coverage leans. The claims behind it follow.
Reality
- Evidence58
- Adoption9
- Hype gap0
- Incentives
- Insufficient
- Confidence55
Claim ledger
Ranked by verification strength, evidence, and original report placement.
- [1]
According to a new study from Lund University, only 9% of the world's largest companies in sectors with a major impact on biodiversity use biodiversity indicators.
- [2]
Researchers from Lund University reviewed sustainability reports from 89 of the world's largest companies operating in the sectors with the greatest impact on biodiversity: food, beverages, tobacco, apparel, chemicals, construction, energy and mining.
- [3]
Eight of the 89 companies reported using biodiversity indicators to inform their decisions.
- [4]
Only two of the eight companies reported using more than one biodiversity indicator.
- [5]
The researchers conducted analyses comparing four different indicators; the results show the indicators often differ in their assessments of how important a geographic area is for biodiversity.
- [6]
A company that uses only one indicator risks concluding that an area is of little importance for biodiversity, even though it may be highly valuable from perspectives that the particular indicator does not capture.
- [7]
The researchers present seven recommendations, including using composite indicators cautiously, mainly as an initial screening tool, and relying on individual indicators for important decisions.
- [8]
"Different indicators measure different aspects of nature. Our results show that no single biodiversity indicator provides a complete picture. Companies that rely on only one indicator may therefore make decisions that protect one biodiversity value while damaging another."
ReportedSupportedSource: William Sidemo Holm, Lund University researcher, quoted by phys.orgView cited source - [9]
The study is William Sidemo-Holm et al, 'Biodiversity at risk when businesses rely on narrow indicators', Journal of Cleaner Production (2026).
- [10]
The researchers recommend assessing biodiversity at the ecoregion level, not only globally, to recognize important biodiversity in less species-rich ecosystems.
- [11]
The researchers recommend using more than one indicator per biodiversity aspect when possible, reducing bias from specific data sets or methods.
- [12]
The researchers recommend developing new indicators for underrepresented biodiversity dimensions such as genetic diversity and ecological connectivity, and improving taxonomic coverage, especially for plants, fungi and invertebrates, which are currently underrepresented.
- [13]
The researchers recommend combining biodiversity indicators with assessments of future human pressures, such as projected land-use change, to better inform business decisions.
- [14]
"If companies want to understand and report their impact on biodiversity accurately, they need to use several indicators rather than a single measure. Indicators can play a crucial role in informing decisions that affect biodiversity, but there is still considerable room for improvement in how they are used today."
- [15]
The researchers recommend using multiple biodiversity indicators to capture different aspects of biodiversity and avoid overlooking important values.
- [16]
Eight of 89 companies is about 9.0%.
- [17]
Two of 89 companies reported using more than one indicator, about 2.2% of the sample.
- [18]
Six of the eight companies that reported using biodiversity indicators reported using only one.
- [19]
81 of the 89 companies reviewed did not report using biodiversity indicators to inform decisions.
Sources
1 independent publisher whose own reporting we read for this story.
- phys.orgOnly 9% of major companies use biodiversity indicators, study finds
1 article · October 8, 2026
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