Over half of global gross domestic product is dependent on nature, yet the past decades have seen unprecedented damage to ecosystems and declines in biodiversity due to adverse human activities. Financial institutions (FIs) can play an important role in securing a nature-positive future. Decisions by FIs over capital allocation and risk pricing influence structural shifts in the real economy that have profound impacts on nature. Today, opportunities to align nature and capital in ways that benefit people, nature and FIs are missed because these impacts are not accounted for. Our aim is to contribute the foundational networks, upskilling of researchers and robust, standardised methods and tools needed to integrate biodiversity and nature into financial decision making. Our focus is the scenarios used by FIs to influence risk pricing and investment decisions, alongside the relevant and suitable data and tools needed for scenario analysis, such as asset-level data and tools to assess nature-related financial risks. A further novel aspect of our proposal is the on integrated nature-climate scenarios. Scenarios and analytics for use by FIs must consider biodiversity and climate in an integrated way. Biodiversity and climate are often treated in siloes, driving potential systemic risks. Important interactions and feedbacks are not accounted for, leading to underestimation of risks and critical tipping points. An important innovation in our proposal is to bring together the IPBES, IPCC and FI scenarios communities, leaders of whom are partners to this project, to address this gap. Integrating nature and climate requires new science; our proposal is to develop the networks and co-design and pilot the frameworks to achieve this - i.e. the foundational common framework and language needed to close the gap. This will create the foundation to Phase 2 that will generate the new datasets and toolkits needed. Here we particularly target scenarios and analytics for use by Central Banks and Supervisors (CB&Ss). This is because CB&Ss are important catalysts of wider action by FIs. Supervisory expectations and regulations, e.g. disclosure, capital requirements and stress-testing, set the rules by which FIs operate, while monetary policies shape the playing field, together having a major influence on global capital flows and so nature. In developing this proposal, we have consulted with the leading CB&Ss and policy makers (e.g. Defra, HMT) that are shaping this agenda and leading work on scenarios, all of whom have agreed to join the project as project partners. This includes the European Central Bank, the Banque de France, De Nederlandsche Bank, the Network of Central Banks and Supervisors (CB&Ss) for Greening the Financial System (NGFS), and the Task Force on Nature-Related Financial Disclosures (TNFD). Phase 1 of the project will deliver several important building blocks. Firstly, it will establish and operationalise the multi-disciplinary nature-climate-finance network. Secondly, it will co-develop the framework and guidance to generate the nature-climate scenarios and analytics, alongside syntheses of evidence and gap analyses. Finally, it will deliver a demonstrator application to a CB&S use case in stress testing nature-related risks. We will capture lessons learnt through this project to inform Phase 2, as well as share them to inform the development of the wider NERC Nature Positive Futures (NPF) programme. Our goal is that the network and the analytical framework developed will ultimately catalyse shifts in financial flows that reduce systemic risks and are aligned with a nature-positive future. Through consultations, we have understood the key milestones and actors to achieve this and shaped the project accordingly. We will work closely with our project partners, and link to UKCGFI, to ensure our outputs feed into the key processes, as well as collaborate with and support the wider NPF programme goals.

Nitrogen compounds are essential for life. They are needed to make many biological compounds including proteins, amino acids, DNA and ATP (the 'fuel source' of cells), without which no living organism could survive. Nitrogen is particularly important because it often limits food production, while high levels of N compounds in the environment lead to serious pollution problems. By supplying N fertilizers, farmers greatly improve their yields. This has been essential to feed the growing world population over the last century, with N fertilizers estimated to sustain ~3.5 billion people, almost half of humanity. While the increased manufacture and mobilization of reactive N sources can be seen as a great feat of 'geoengineering', there have been many unintended consequences. A growing human population needs more food, so more fertilizers, especially as we now eat more animal products per person. The result is a complex web of pollution issues, threatening water, air and soil quality, altering climate balance and impacting on ecosystems and human health. In addition to the loss of N from farms, other sources cannot be forgotten. These include air emissions from burning, and losses to water from sewage systems. Overall, human alteration of the global N cycle makes for a multi-issue problem that ranks alongside climate change as one of the great challenges of the 21st century. The European Nitrogen Assessment has estimated that N pollution alone causes 70-320 billion Euro per year of damage across the EU (Nature, 14 April 2011,472,159). Given the wide diversity of nitrogen loss pathways into the environment, there are many potential solutions. In a recent report 'Our Nutrient World' led by CEH for the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP, launched Feb 2013), 10 key actions were identified which would contribute to better nutrient management, simultaneously helping to meet food security goals while reducing the pollution of air, land and water, with multiple benefits for ecosystems, climate and human health. However, 'Our Nutrient World' also identified that there is currently no global international agreement that links the many benefits and threats of nitrogen. As a result, there is also no coordinated scientific assessment and support process to quantify and demonstrate these linkages. This gap is now being addressed by the International Opportunities Fund (IOF) of the NERC through its support for a new endeavour "Pump priming to towards the International Nitrogen Management System" - or 'INMSpp' for short. The central idea is that a scientific support system is needed that can provide the evidence needed to show how joined-up management of the global nitrogen cycle will deliver multiple benefits, and to be able to evaluate options that policy makers may wish to consider. Already there is a developing ambition for INMS as reflected by the invitation from the UN Global Environment Facility (GEF) for the NERC Centre for Ecology and Hydrology (CEH) to work with UNEP to develop a concept to establish a future INMS approach. Ultimately this would be a major endeavour, linking indicators, models and datasets to allow evaluation of possible international agreements. The INMS pump priming project provides a key step towards this eventual goal. As one of the key challenges to establish model chains from source to impact to mitigation and adaptation the INMSpp project has taken on the task of working out how integrated global modelling of the nitrogen cycle should be developed. The project will bring together a global consortium to examine how models can be joined up to demonstrate the net benefits of better nitrogen management. This will be a key resource as the INMS approach is developed. The outcome is the prospect to show how linking up different international environmental agreements can build common ground, simultaneously supporting food and energy security and a cleaner environment.