Planetary solvency: tipping into the wild unknown
‘Planetary Solvency: Tipping into the wild unknown’, a new report from the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries (IFoA) and Anglia Ruskin University (ARU) warns that biodiversity loss, climate shocks and geopolitical conflict are disrupting the food system, risking catastrophic impacts for the financial system and for society as a whole.
It is explained that chronic pressures such as soil degradation and water scarcity are already leading to lower crop yields, pushing up food prices and reducing availability. Acute shocks including trade disruption, extreme weather events and ecological collapse add further stresses, resulting in higher and more volatile food prices.
The report warns that urgent intervention is needed and highlights actions for policymakers, regulators and those working in the financial sector, to integrate nature into decision making in order to safeguard the food system. These include:
- Urgent investment in measures to support sustainable land use, protect pollinators and strengthen supply-chain resilience. Prevention is cheaper than crisis response and reduces the likelihood of acute shocks such as crop failures and recurrent double digit food price inflation.
- Policymakers and regulators recognising nature as the critical foundation of our society and economy, using integrated climate-nature scenarios to understand the interconnection between biodiversity and climate.
- Actuaries and the financial sector recognising food system fragility is a systemic financial risk, with impacts far greater than the GDP contribution of agriculture.
Aled Jones HonFIA, lead author and Director, Global Sustainability Institute, Anglia Ruskin University, said:
“The recent National Security Assessment on Global Ecosystems from the UK Government has shown that the potential collapse of nature is a realistic possibility. Our current economy is set up to deliver efficiency, profit and thereby a just-in-time system that both drives this threat and provides little to no resilience against it.
“We need radical new policy and direction to tackle these emerging risks and, with this report, the actuarial profession is signalling its desire to contribute its unique expertise to shaping our response. In the report, we highlight key risks from food through pandemics and outline a set of recommendations including the need to move away from waiting to measure and quantify everything before we take the urgent action that is needed.”