Section 4 – Governance and strategy

Module 2 – Climate risk maturity assessment

Climate risk is reshaping the risk landscape for FIs. Regulators, investors and society increasingly expect organisations to show not only awareness, but also credible management of climate-related risks and opportunities.

Assessing climate risk is therefore a strategic necessity. By evaluating how climate considerations are integrated across governance, strategy, risk management and disclosure, FIs can:

• Identify vulnerabilities and blind spots that may expose them to financial, reputational or regulatory risks as climate impacts grow.
• Strengthen decision-making by providing a clear evidence base for strategic choices, resource allocation and risk appetite.
• Drive organisational learning through continuous improvement and adaptive governance, helping teams to respond proactively to changing climate and market conditions.
• Support regulatory and stakeholder readiness by aligning processes with international best practices and disclosure standards, ensuring future reporting is coherent and credible.
• Enhance market positioning by demonstrating leadership and resilience to investors, clients and regulators through measurable progress along the climate risk maturity curve.
• Build a reputation as a trusted steward, making it an attractive partner for DFIs and MDBs.
• Capture first-mover advantage by helping clients to strengthen their climate resilience relative to competitors.

Undertaking a maturity assessment is the crucial first step in developing an effective climate risk strategy. It enables senior management to move beyond isolated efforts and manage climate risk as an organisation-wide priority. Tool 1 offers a structured, practical approach to help map your organisation’s current position and guide its journey toward greater climate resilience.

Tool 1: Climate Risk Maturity Assessment

The climate risk maturity assessment is a structured Excel-based questionnaire to help FIs to assess their current level of climate risk maturity. Organisations can compare their governance, strategy, risk management and disclosure practices with evolving regulatory and market expectations. By working through the questions, FIs can identify strengths, reveal capability gaps, and prioritise areas for improvement. The results can offer FIs a clear picture of the current position on climate risk management, helping to guide internal discussions, shape action plans, and demonstrate progress to regulators, investors and counterparties.

Rubric 1 shows what effective climate risk integration looks like at each stage of maturity.

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