ABSTRACT Biodiversity loss and ecosystem degradation represent critical threats to human well‐being and economic resilience, challenging businesses to understand and manage their interdependence with natural systems. This study develops a systemic framework—the BioModel—that elucidates the reciprocal relationship between businesses, biodiversity, and ecosystems. Adopting a mixed‐methods design that combines an extensive review of academic and gray literature with a series of focus groups involving experts and practitioners, the research co‐constructs a theoretically grounded yet practically applicable model. The BioModel identifies 16 types of corporate impacts and 24 ecosystem services, classifying them into coherent drivers and dependency categories. It demonstrates how these relationships can be modeled to capture both the “impacts on” and “dependencies from” natural capital, aligning with the principle of double materiality introduced by the EU Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive. The discussion emphasizes the model's potential to bridge ecological science and corporate management by translating complex ecological interconnections into decision‐relevant structures. Ultimately, the study concludes that BioModel provides a foundational tool for assessing, managing, and reporting biodiversity‐related risks and opportunities, thereby potentially enabling businesses to integrate ecological considerations into strategic and operational decision‐making.
Cinquini et al. (2026) studied this question.