The UN admits member states ‘seem incapable of coming together’—but it’s still notching wins with the private sector

It didn’t help that President Joe Biden’s speech at the UN yesterday lacked the punch an American president typically exudes on that stage. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine sat in the audience while Biden spoke of the West’s unwavering support of Ukraine, but more telling was the absence of heads of state from the UN Security Council’s other “permanent five” members: China, the United Kingdom, France, and, of course, Russia itself.  

Yet it would be a mistake to write off the UN entirely. The body has made great strikes in enlisting the private sector. It was the UN, after all, that came up with “environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) factors in investment decisions.” The UN and its “conference of the parties” (COP) on climate and biodiversity also served as the starting point for many private sector frameworks and commitments on climate- and nature-related disclosures. 

On climate, as Alan noted yesterday, recent progress has stalled. But on nature and biodiversity, momentum is building. This week, the Taskforce on Nature-Related Financial Disclosuresreleased its recommendations for companies to “report and act on nature-related dependencies.” In simple terms, the TNFD helps companies ensure their work doesn’t deplete freshwater or destroy forests, for example. It is the “nature” equivalent of climate disclosures, Claire Lund, global vice president of sustainability at pharmaceutical giant GSK, an early TNFD adopter, told me yesterday. 

Not everyone will back the disclosures, but several of the dozens of companies that support TNFD, including GSK, will start reporting them in their financial accounting in 2026. (Holcim, the world’s largest construction materials company whose site I’m visiting today in Eclépens, is another that will follow suit.) It will be one way the UN agenda lives on despite geopolitical discord.

More news below.

Peter Vanham
peter.vanham@fortune.com
@petervanham

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