Visa has formed a partnership with Ample Earth, a UK-based climate FinTech, to integrate sustainability data into the payment ecosystem.

The collaboration aims to embed merchant-specific environmental and social impact insights into digital banking apps and loyalty programmes, helping banks and payment providers promote and reward sustainable behaviour.

Ample Earth leverages AI-powered solutions to analyse merchants’ sustainability performance, transforming unstructured data into accessible information. The system uses clear eco-labels and social tags, such as “Zero-Waste”, “Living Wage Employer” and “B Corp”, to help consumers and institutions understand the impact of their spending choices.

Through this partnership, Visa and Ample Earth plan to make sustainability data a core feature of everyday financial decision-making. By integrating these insights into banking platforms, banks can better segment customers and develop new ways to engage and incentivise sustainable practices.

Visa recently published a whitepaper, “Unleashing the potential of sustainability data”, highlighting the growing influence of sustainability on customer behaviour and the increasing importance of responsible spending in the payments industry.

The whitepaper also addresses ongoing challenges, such as the inconsistency and unreliability of available sustainability data, and the persistent risk of greenwashing. Both companies have identified structural issues, including the lack of detailed and verifiable data, and the difficulties of adapting sustainability metrics to different markets. The partnership is intended to overcome these challenges by standardising and simplifying sustainability information for both businesses and consumers.

Visa said the collaboration marks the beginning of a new era in which sustainability data becomes integral to commerce, strengthening the role of financial institutions in encouraging responsible consumer and business choices. “We envision a future where sustainability is not just a consideration, but a built-in feature of everyday commerce,” Visa stated.

Raja Darbari, co-founder and chief executive officer of Ample Earth, said the initiative is designed to make sustainability data easy to digest and relatable, empowering people to use their purchasing power as a force for good. She added: “People do not have time to fact-check sustainability claims, but they do want clarity and accessible information. We aim to bridge that gap and make sustainability data easy to digest and relatable.”

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