TNFD Explained: Recommendations, LEAP, DIROs and How to Start Nature-Related Reporting

ANSWER · EXPLAIN · APPLY · EVIDENCE · CONNECT · PUBLISH

London Reporting Academy · Controlled publication draft · 3 August 2026

TNFD is a disclosure framework designed to improve the quality, consistency and comparability of information about an organisation’s nature-related issues. It builds on the reporting architecture developed by the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) and reflected in the ISSB Standards. Its intended users include investors and other providers of capital, while its design can also accommodate broader impact-focused reporting where a preparer needs or chooses to apply an additional impact-materiality lens.

At framework level, TNFD adoption is voluntary. It is not a certification scheme, a legal opinion, an assurance standard or a licence to describe a report as complete merely because the four pillar headings appear. A separate jurisdiction, exchange, lender, customer or parent group may make related information compulsory, but that obligation arises outside the TNFD Recommendations and must be assessed separately.

Figure 1. TNFD disclosure architecture. LEAP supports assessment; it does not replace the recommended disclosures.

The four pillars are connected. Governance explains who oversees and manages nature-related issues. Strategy explains the identified DIROs and their effects on the business model, value chain, strategy and financial planning. Risk and impact management explains the assessment and management processes. Metrics and targets show how performance and response are measured. A report that treats each pillar as a separate narrative risks contradiction: the risks in Strategy should be traceable to the processes in Risk and Impact Management, the metrics should monitor the same issues, and governance should show how decisions were made.

The general requirements are not introductory background. They are cross-cutting preparation rules that shape all four pillars and help users understand what was assessed, what was disclosed and how to interpret the information. A first-time reporter should turn them into a basis-of-preparation section and a review checklist.

Dependencies, impacts, risks and opportunities are related but not interchangeable. A dependency is an aspect of ecosystem services or environmental assets on which the organisation relies. An impact is a change in the state of nature caused, contributed to or linked to the organisation’s activities. Those dependencies and impacts can generate risks and opportunities for the organisation, but the causal pathway should be documented rather than assumed.

For example, a food manufacturer may depend on reliable freshwater supply and pollination. Water abstraction and land conversion may also contribute to ecosystem degradation. Drought, catchment restrictions, supplier disruption or litigation can create operational and financial risk. Investment in regenerative sourcing, product redesign or catchment restoration may create resilience, market or financing opportunities. The report should show which links are evidence-based, the relevant locations and time horizons, and where uncertainty remains.

Nature is spatially explicit. The consequence of water withdrawal depends on the basin; the significance of land disturbance depends on ecosystem condition, species and connectivity; the same commodity can present different dependencies and impacts in different sourcing regions. TNFD therefore asks organisations to identify priority locations and to disclose Strategy D information about assets or activities meeting the priority-location criteria.

Location precision should improve over time, but false precision is not progress. Teams should record the source and resolution of coordinates, the link to the reporting entity or supplier, the biome or ecosystem classification, data dates and uncertainty. Aggregation is appropriate only where locations share relevant characteristics and aggregation does not obscure material information.

TNFD provides core global disclosure metrics and additional sector guidance, but a useful metric set begins with the material DIROs and management decisions. Risk and opportunity metrics may monitor financial exposure, operational disruption or strategic response. Dependency and impact metrics may cover impact drivers, ecosystem condition, species, extent, ecosystem services or the organisation’s footprint in priority locations. Targets need a boundary, baseline, time frame, method, responsible owner and performance evidence.

A common first-year error is to publish every biodiversity number already available while leaving the key decision pathways unmeasured. The opposite error is to wait for perfect ecological data. A proportionate approach uses the best available primary, modelled and proxy data, labels their status and limitations, and creates a remediation plan for the metrics most relevant to decisions and disclosures.

LEAP stands for Locate, Evaluate, Assess and Prepare. It is an internal due-diligence assessment approach designed to help organisations identify and assess nature-related issues and prepare responses and disclosures. The detailed guidance contains a scoping phase and 16 components from L1 to P4. TNFD describes LEAP as flexible, iterative and adaptable; components do not have to be followed in a strict linear sequence.

Figure 2. A practical twelve-month roadmap. The sequence is illustrative and should be adapted to the organisation’s reporting calendar and maturity.

The roadmap should be governed through decision gates rather than a single sustainability-team workplan. Finance validates links to planning and financial effects; risk validates taxonomy, prioritisation and ERM integration; environment and operational teams validate ecological evidence; procurement and commercial teams support value-chain traceability; legal and reporting teams control claims, placement and limitations; the board or relevant committee approves the reporting basis and material conclusions.

TNFD’s 14 recommended disclosures comprise three Governance disclosures: board oversight; management’s role; and human-rights policies, engagement and oversight for Indigenous Peoples, Local Communities and affected stakeholders. Strategy has four: DIROs by time horizon; effects on business model, value chain, strategy and financial planning; resilience under scenarios; and priority locations. Risk and impact management has four—direct-operations processes, value-chain processes, management and overall risk-management integration—while Metrics and targets has three: risk-and-opportunity metrics, dependency-and-impact metrics, and targets and performance.

DIROs are dependencies, impacts, risks and opportunities. A dependency is an aspect of ecosystem services or environmental assets on which the organisation relies; an impact is a change in nature caused, contributed to or linked to its activities; and those dependencies and impacts can create risks or opportunities for the organisation.