This Working Paper was commissioned by the UNEP Inquiry into the Design of a Sustainable Finance System (“the Inquiry”) to feed into its process of analysis and knowledge dissemination. This Working Paper has attempted to do three things:
1- summarise the underlying logic for why the financial sector should care about the state of the environment and environment-related risks;
2- review the main structural barriers that could prevent the financial system from managing such issues;
3- identify the main researchers and organisations undertaking work on these topics internationally.
The aspiration being that this document should be a useful initial reference guide to those concerned with both how environment-related risks could affect the financial sector and what financial institutions can do to manage such risks.