Fortune Global 500 companies continue to setting quantifiable and time-bound targets related to nature. According to partner Joshua Katz and coauthors, in 2024 companies overall increased pledges made across five of the six dimensions of nature that the team analyzed—including water, chemicals and plastics, biodiversity, forests, and nutrients or nitrogen oxides.
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A set of 6 stacked bar graphs show the percentage of Fortune Global 500 companies with nature-related targets and acknowledgments from 2022 to 2024, broken into the following categories: carbon, water, chemicals and plastics, biodiversity, forest, and nutrients or nitrogen oxides. Each bar is split into 3 sections: the bottom section represents the percentage of companies with targets, the middle section represents the percentage of companies with acknowledgments, and the top section represents those with neither. The categories are ordered from highest to lowest, based on the 2024 combination of target and acknowledgement, with carbon leading the way at 94%, water at 86%, chemicals and plastics at 82%, biodiversity at 76%, forest at 71%, and nutrients or nitrogen oxides at 44% in 2024. In 2022, 83% of companies had carbon targets and 15% had carbon acknowledgments. By 2024, the percentage of companies with carbon targets was estimated at 78%, while the percentage with acknowledgments was projected to increase to 16%.
Footnote: Targets are limited to commitments that are quantifiable and time bound. Targets for each dimension at the enterprise level are defined as follows: carbon: any target that addresses reduction of CO_ equivalent emissions (Scope 1, 2, or 3); water: any target that explicitly commits to reducing quantity of freshwater use in direct or indirect operations; chemicals and plastics: any target that addresses reduction of plastic pollution or chemical pollutants, improving water quality, reduction of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) use, and/or increasing circularity; biodiversity: any target that addresses protecting or improving biodiversity elements such as land conservation, habitat protection, ecosystem degradation, and/or species protection; forest: any target that addresses tree planting, deforestation avoidance, or forest protection; nutrients and nitrogen oxides: any target that addresses nitrogen or phosphorous runoff, improving soil health, and/or reduction in use of harmful fertilizers.
Source: McKinsey analysis of Fortune Global 500 company sustainability reports and websites.
Note: This image description was completed with the assistance of Writer, a generative AI tool.
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To read the article, see “Corporate commitments to nature have evolved since 2022,” December 10, 2024.