JGP Asset Management TNFD Pilot:

What the Pilot Set Out to Do

JGP selected two medium-sized agricultural companies from within its ESG Credit fund for assessment. One represented a significant existing investment; the other was a company JGP was considering financing but had not yet engaged. This meant the LEAP approach was applied simultaneously as a tool for reviewing an existing investment and as part of a pre-investment due diligence process, demonstrating the flexibility of the framework across different use cases.

Both companies operated in tropical and subtropical forest biomes and intensive land use systems in Brazil. The focus on deforestation was set by the NICFI funding scope, but also aligned directly with JGP's existing strategic priorities around responsible agricultural investment.

How the Assessment Was Structured

Locate: Mapping the Business Footprint

Because JGP had embedded location data sharing requirements into its ESG Credit fund agreements, both assessed companies were able to provide the precise property boundaries of their farm locations, registered through Brazil's Cadastro Ambiental Rural (CAR) system. The CAR system is a government-administered georeferenced land registry and is one of the most detailed of its kind in the world, though it is not available in equivalent form in most other jurisdictions.

Using the CAR IDs, Frontierra mapped the precise boundaries of each farm location within GIS software. This level of location precision is non-negotiable for a credible TNFD LEAP assessment. GIS is the only tool capable of undertaking the location-based analysis required at the detail and scale the LEAP approach demands, enabling comparison of farm boundaries against nature-related datasets across large areas and multiple timescales.

Frontierra's Climate and Nature Intelligence Platform is designed to make this location-level analysis accessible at scale.

Evaluate: Dependencies, Impacts and Sensitive Locations

With farm locations mapped, Frontierra compared each site against key state-of-nature datasets relevant to agricultural operations, including biodiversity hotspots, protected areas, Indigenous territories, deforestation data and water risk. The Encore platform was used to identify material ecosystem service dependencies, such as freshwater, soil stability and flood protection, and the impacts those operations generate on surrounding nature.

To prioritise across locations, Frontierra applied an Overall Biodiversity Impact Rating (OBIR), combining indicator scores into a composite rating for each farm. Any farm with recent deforestation detected within its boundaries was automatically classified as priority, regardless of its overall score.

Assess: Risks, Opportunities and Financial Implications

A longlist of nature-related risks and opportunities was developed collaboratively with JGP through workshops, drawing on the Locate and Evaluate findings. Risk identification brought together JGP's ESG, risk management, investment and communications teams, reflecting the importance of multiple internal perspectives in understanding what deforestation exposure means in financial terms.

The assessment confirmed that deforestation risk management could be integrated into JGP's existing climate and ESG strategies. It also surfaced nature-positive investment opportunities, including improved carbon credit pricing and a basis for measuring biodiversity credits within the same investment structures. This integration of climate and nature risk is central to how Frontierra's climate risk assessment service and nature risk service work together within a single platform.

Prepare: Disclosure and Next Steps

JGP reviewed the actions and disclosure requirements arising from the pilot and identified updates needed to existing policies and processes. The firm recognised that increased awareness and training across the business would be required, along with additional tools and software to support ongoing nature risk monitoring. Existing internal frameworks for target-setting and performance measurement would be adapted to incorporate nature-related KPIs. JGP committed to releasing its first TNFD report in 2024, and following completion of the pilot, went on to become an Early Adopter of the TNFD.

Key Findings from the Pilot

Three findings from this pilot are of direct relevance to other asset managers approaching TNFD for the first time.

Finding 1: The LEAP approach works for both existing investments and pre-investment due diligence

Applying it to a company under active consideration demonstrated that nature risk screening can be embedded into investment decisions before capital is committed, not just as a retrospective exercise on assets already held.

Finding 2: GIS is not optional

The Locate stage of the LEAP process cannot be completed to a meaningful standard without GIS software. The volume and spatial complexity of the data involved, hundreds of individual farm locations compared against multiple nature datasets across different timescales, requires tools that spreadsheets and manual processes cannot replicate.

Finding 3: Embedding data sharing requirements contractually is one of the most important steps a financial institution can take

JGP's ability to obtain precise boundary data from both assessed companies directly resulted from requirements built into fund agreements in advance. For institutions that have not yet done this, building it into new agreements as a condition of financing is a practical and high-impact starting point.

Get Started with Frontierra

Whether you are assessing deforestation exposure within an existing portfolio, building nature risk into a pre-investment due diligence process, or preparing for TNFD disclosure, Frontierra has the tools and experience to support you.

Get in touch with our team to discuss your requirements, or visit the Frontierra Media page for further thinking on deforestation risk and nature-related financial disclosures.

For a full introduction to the framework, read our guide to TNFD: what it is, who it applies to, and how to get started.