About the initiative

The PRI is developing a new collaborative stewardship initiative on nature (“Spring”). We will convene a group of investors, who will use their voice and influence to drive positive outcomes for nature. 

The initiative aims to maximise the investment community’s contribution to the global goal of halting and reversing biodiversity loss by 2030, including commodity-driven deforestation. By addressing biodiversity loss, the initiative also aims to contribute to other sustainable development goals, including mitigating and adapting to climate change and advancing human rights.

The initiative will focus on enabling policy alignment and implementation across geographies to help generate positive outcomes for nature and investor portfolios. Responsible political engagement from companies can help enable such public policies. Spring intends to engage companies that have an influential voice in shaping public policies relating to deforestation dynamics, either through their direct political engagement or indirectly through their membership in or association with trade associations, think tanks and similar bodies.

Please visit our website to find out more about the initiative.

The role of endorsers

The initiative is now open to endorsers. Endorsers publicly sign the Spring investor expectation statement (available in the attachments below and on the PRI website), signalling their support for the initiative’s objectives and high-level company expectations.

This investor statement outlines the initiative’s high-level views on the need for action and its expectations of companies. The expectations outlined in this investor statement are aligned to those of other collaborative engagement initiatives. This includes (but is not limited to) Nature Action 100, Investor Policy Dialogue on Deforestation and Finance Sector Deforestation Action.   

Endorsers are required to be a PRI signatory asset owner, investment manager or service provider.

Endorsers who outsource their stewardship activities are also encouraged to request that their investment managers and engagement service providers with responsibility for engagement apply to take part in Spring or commit to aligning their own engagements to the objectives of the initiative.

There are no other joining requirements, and endorsers retain complete discretion over whether and how to support any given engagement activity.

How to sign up

PRI signatories can sign-up to endorse Spring by requesting to join this group on the Collaboration Platform. You will then be required to complete a short form to confirm your organisation’s endorsement and provide us with further information (this should take approximately 10 minutes to complete). You will receive an email notification through the Collaboration Platform once your endorsement has been registered (subject to meeting the joining requirement).

Once your sign-up has been processed, you will be admitted into the Collaboration Platform group. You will not be able to see the list of other endorsers within this group until we publicly announce the full set of endorsers in early 2024.

PLEASE NOTE: you will only be able to request to join this group if you are logged into the Collaboration Platform. If you do not have an account, you can register here.

We ask that only one person signs-up through the Collaboration Platform on behalf of their organisation. You will be given the opportunity to provide details of additional contacts from your organisation to receive important information regarding the initiative.

Investors are able to sign-up as an endorser at any time throughout the initiative, however the first set of endorsers of the initiative will be publicly announced in early 2024, therefore investors are encouraged to sign-up by 19 January 2024 to be included in this list.

Next steps

In early 2024, we expect to release our focus company list and begin recruiting initiative participants, who will carry out day-to-day engagement activities with selected companies (as collaborating and/or lead investor(s)).

PRI signatories interested in joining the initiative as a participant are encouraged to sign-up up as an endorser in the meantime, to signal their support for the initiative and be involved during its development.

***

If you are having difficulties signing up through the Collaboration Platform, or have a question for the team, please get in touch at spring@unpri.org.