Jessica Smith Nature Lead, UNEP FI

Jessica Smith (BES, MA, MCom) leads the Nature workstream at the UNEP Finance Initiative since 2020, promoting leadership in sustainable finance across banking, insurance and investment across terrestrial, marine and freshwater ecosystems. She leads UNEP FI’s involvement in the Taskforce on Nature-Related Financial Disclosures (TNFD), Natural Capital Finance Alliance (NCFA) and Exploring Natural Capital Opportunities, Risk and Exposure (ENCORE) programmes, the Sustainable Blue Economy Finance Initiative, the Principles for Responsible Banking (PRB) Biodiversity Community, and other initiatives for nature-related portfolio alignment, risk and disclosure. For the previous 7 years she directed a consultancy firm undertaking environmental finance project development and evaluation, and leading secretariats for the Equator Principles Association (environmental and social risk in project finance for 100+ financial institutions) and the Cross-Sector Biodiversity Initiative (applying IFC performance standard 6 on biodiversity in oil & gas, mining, and finance). Prior to this Jessica worked for UNEP-WCMC, IUCN and UNDP, mobilising pro-poor environment and development finance, globally and especially across Africa.