#43 Nature on the Balance Sheet: Risk, Return and Responsibility | Tony O'Grady

How natural capital accounting lets CFOs price ecosystem risk, secure Indo-Pacific supply chains and find new value.

Nature underpins every tonne shipped, meal served and unit of power generated across the Indo-Pacific - yet its true worth still hides off the books.

In this episode of Intelligence Optimised Podcasts, CSIRO’s Dr Tony O’Grady joins host Todd Crowley to unpack natural capital accounting: a rigorous method that treats forests, water and soils as real assets alongside plant, property and equipment.

Key points for finance and risk leaders:
✔️ Map ecosystem dependencies in supply chains - why fertiliser phosphorus or coastal mangroves are as material as diesel prices.
✔️ Use TNFD-aligned metrics to convert ecosystem services into dollars, then slot them into balance-sheets, cash-flow models and board packs.
✔️ See how companies like Forico, BHP and Kering publish environmental profit-and-loss statements and what that does to cost of capital.
✔️ Understand disclosure momentum - TNFD, TCFD and IFRS - and why waiting invites higher finance costs and shareholder activism.
✔️ Spot the geopolitical edge: unpriced degradation fuels migration, food insecurity and defence flashpoints from Nauru to the South China Sea.

Strategic takeaways
✔️ Early movers gain cheaper capital, steadier inputs and brand trust while competitors scramble under new compliance.
✔️ The board, not the sustainability team, must own nature risk; CFOs already have the valuation tools.
✔️ Reliable data are emerging - CSIRO’s Natural Capital Handbook and spatial datasets make entry affordable.

For defence planners, agribusiness exporters and infrastructure owners, the signal is clear: price nature now or pay later.

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