How do you make the impact that products have on nature visible to consumers? And reward companies that take positive steps to reduce this impact?

It’s a difficult, and important, question, and Dutch chemist chain Kruidvat has a new answer.

Invoking the “Fire Risk Today” sign’s rainbow visuals to depict a score ranging from Low to Very High, the company has launched the “Nature Impact Score”. Developed by Global Sustainable Enterprise System (GSES), it visualises the nature impact of products, including categories including water, soil, and air quality, circularity, CO2 emissions, (renewable) energy use, air pollution and water use. The data is collated and combined with equal weighting to arrive at an overall Nature Impact Score rating. It’s aligned to the internationally recognised GSES methodology, with independent verification and certification lending credibility to the outputs.

Kruidvat hopes that adopting a uniform standard, backed by transparent data and methodologies will help to make sustainability communication accessible for companies and their customers. This data is viewable both in store and online and appears on around 1,000 items.

As the technical aspects of reporting can sound drought-inducingly dry, this is an excellent step in the direction of cross-industry adoption of measures that highlight businesses’ impact on nature, while directing customers towards products with lighter environmental footprints. Hopefully other industries take note of this initiative and feel inspired to make a splash. It’s also a pertinent example of a company pioneering voluntary action on nature reporting, highlighting the importance of sitting ahead of mandatory requirements in a maturing nature reporting landscape.

With the storm clouds containing mandatory nature reporting frameworks like ESRS E4 and TNFD now gathering, companies that build robust data collection and transparent methodologies today will avoid being washed away when disclosure moves from being a competitive differentiator to a legal requirement.

And for now, we welcome steps towards a world where making sustainable choices across our purchases is made simple and companies can reap the rewards of driving real nature-positive action. It’s always sunny in Positive nature impact-elphia!