Skip to content
DraconiticResearch
Search Sources API
186,086 studies31 sourcesUpdated 44 min ago
Peer-reviewedCC BYJournal of Industrial Ecology

Value-transforming financial, carbon and biodiversity footprint accounting

  • Sami El Geneidy1,2
  • Maiju Peura3,2
  • Viivi-Maija Aumanen4
  • Stefan Baumeister1,2
  • Ulla T. Helimo3,4,2
  • Veera Vainio3,2
  • Janne Sakari Kotiaho3,2
4 affiliations
  1. 1School of Business and Economics, University of Jyväskylä, P.O. Box 35, N40014, Jyvaskyla, Finland
  2. 2School of Resource Wisdom, University of Jyväskylä, Seminaarinkatu 15, P.O. Box 35, N40014, Jyvaskyla, Finland
  3. 3Department of Biological and Environmental Science, University of Jyväskylä, P.O. Box 35, N40014, Jyvaskyla, Finland
  4. 4Division of Policy and Planning, University of Jyväskylä, P.O. Box 35, N40014, Jyvaskyla, Finland
Open at sourcePDFDOICite

Abstract

Transformative changes in our production and consumption habits are needed to halt biodiversity loss. Organizations are the way we humans have organized our everyday life, and much of our negative environmental impacts, also called carbon and biodiversity footprints, are caused by organizations. Here we explore how the activity data of any organization can be exploited to develop integrated carbon and biodiversity footprints. As a metric we utilize spatially explicit potential global loss of species across all ecosystem types and argue that it can be understood as the biodiversity equivalent. The utility of the biodiversity equivalent for biodiversity could be like what carbon dioxide equivalent is for climate. We provide a global country-specific dataset that organizations, experts and researchers can use to assess biodiversity footprints of human activities. We also argue that the current integration of financial and environmental accounting is superficial, and provide a framework for a more robust financial value-transforming accounting model. To test the methodologies, we utilized a Finnish university as a living lab. Assigning an offsetting cost to the footprints significantly altered the financial value of the organization. We believe such value-transforming accounting is needed to draw the attention of senior executives and investors to the negative environmental impacts of their organizations.

Related

  1. Reforestation Policy under Carbon Taxation: Climate Efficacy, Biodiversity, and Macro-Financial Risks
    Matthieu Bordenave
    HALPreprintCC BY-NC-ND 4.0Full textEcologyClimate scienceHAL
  2. Towards Biodiversity Indicators from Opportunistic Records: Standardizing Sampling Effort and Accounting for Observer Behavior in French Coleoptera
    Julien Touroult
    DiversityPeer-reviewedCC BY 4.0Full textEcologyZoology & animal behaviourHAL
  3. Analysis of Carbon Footprint and Water Footprint in Laundry MSMEs Business Using Life Cycle Assessment
    Putri Alifa Kholil, Abdul Jabbar, Dhia Sasmita Lantip +2
    Journal of Environmental and Science EducationPeer-reviewedCC BYFull text1 citedEnvironmental science & pollutionDOAJ
  4. Carbon footprint of biomass-derived activated carbon: life cycle assessment, environmental sustainability, and carbon-negative potential.
    Ikhazuagbe Hilary Ifijen
    RSC advancesPeer-reviewedCC BYFull textEnvironmental science & pollutionEurope PMC
  5. Erosion carbon dynamics extend beyond carbon accounting to ecological significance
    Liangang Xiao
    Communications Earth & EnvironmentPeer-reviewedCC BY 4.0Full textGeneral earth scienceCrossrefNature

Cite

BibTeXRIS
BibTeX
@article{geneidy2026valuetransforming,
  title = {{Value-transforming financial, carbon and biodiversity footprint accounting}},
  author = {Sami El Geneidy and Maiju Peura and Viivi-Maija Aumanen and Stefan Baumeister and Ulla T. Helimo and Veera Vainio and Janne Sakari Kotiaho},
  journal = {Journal of Industrial Ecology},
  year = {2026},
  month = aug,
  doi = {10.1007/s44498-026-00151-8},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.1007/s44498-026-00151-8},
  note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY  - JOUR
TI  - Value-transforming financial, carbon and biodiversity footprint accounting
AU  - Sami El Geneidy
AU  - Maiju Peura
AU  - Viivi-Maija Aumanen
AU  - Stefan Baumeister
AU  - Ulla T. Helimo
AU  - Veera Vainio
AU  - Janne Sakari Kotiaho
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/08/03
JO  - Journal of Industrial Ecology
DO  - 10.1007/s44498-026-00151-8
UR  - https://doi.org/10.1007/s44498-026-00151-8
AB  - Transformative changes in our production and consumption habits are needed to halt biodiversity loss. Organizations are the way we humans have organized our everyday life, and much of our negative environmental impacts, also called carbon and biodiversity footprints, are caused by organizations. Here we explore how the activity data of any organization can be exploited to develop integrated carbon and biodiversity footprints. As a metric we utilize spatially explicit potential global loss of species across all ecosystem types and argue that it can be understood as the biodiversity equivalent. The utility of the biodiversity equivalent for biodiversity could be like what carbon dioxide equivalent is for climate. We provide a global country-specific dataset that organizations, experts and researchers can use to assess biodiversity footprints of human activities. We also argue that the current integration of financial and environmental accounting is superficial, and provide a framework for a more robust financial value-transforming accounting model. To test the methodologies, we utilized a Finnish university as a living lab. Assigning an offsetting cost to the footprints significantly altered the financial value of the organization. We believe such value-transforming accounting is needed to draw the attention of senior executives and investors to the negative environmental impacts of their organizations.
SN  - 1088-1980
SN  - 1530-9290
ER  -