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COP28 will be the third Conference of Parties I have reported on the ground from for ESG Clarity, and it is the one I am most concerned about. Apart from the loss and damage fund, little was agreed last year, as we predicted. But this year has the potential to do worse than nothing – … Read more

Professional investors have an appetite to back the ‘S’ in ESG, with nearly two-thirds currently allocating to social bonds or reporting being interested in doing so, according to a survey. Investing in Inclusive Growth, commissioned by Goldman Sachs Asset Management, asked the views of more than 700 investment professionals across 11 key European markets.  Respondents … Read more

There has been an unsubstantiated concern that the twin objectives of seeking out environmental and social impact alongside financial returns may be incompatible. This view belongs to a different era. In reality, finding those companies with a positive social or environmental impact is a powerful way to align an investment strategy with long-term structural trends … Read more

Calvert Research and Management was an early pioneer in ESG before the term was even coined, and was the first US investor to shun South African companies in the 1980s to protest apartheid. Today it channels $34.8bn of investor money towards responsible companies utilizing research, low-cost passive investments and shareholder pressure. Here, managing director, responsible … Read more

CCLA Investment Management is planning to launch the second iteration of its UK mental health benchmark on 5 June this year. The CCLA Corporate Mental Health Benchmark- UK 100 launched in May last year and aims to track and evaluate the UK’s largest listed companies’ approaches to workplace mental health. It was followed in October by … Read more

It is very easy to say ‘just get on with it’ or pretend you are okay. But this should not be the norm. As we found during the Covid-19 pandemic – mental health issues are not easily visible, and they can prohibit people from getting on with so-called ‘easy’ day-to-day tasks. Product provider Embark Group … Read more

Proportionate and balanced regulation has a central role in setting out standards and expectations on sustainability and climate-related goals and can drive positive change. That’s why an open dialogue between our industry and the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) on the shape of the future UK regulatory framework for sustainable finance is essential if the UK … Read more

This month the International Corporate Governance Network (ICGN) has become the latest group to launch a toolkit of investors to assess biodiversity risk. Target 15 of the Global Biodiversity Framework announced at COP15 last year requires large and transnational companies and financial institutions to monitor, assess, and disclose biodiversity risks, dependencies, and impacts from operations, … Read more

Legal and General Capital has appointed former MP Julia Goldsworthy as head of social impact investment. Previously Goldsworthy was director of strategy and economy at the West Midlands Combined Authority, where she led negotiations on the regional second devolution deal and local industrial strategy. Before that she spent three years at PwC focusing on the … Read more

Asian corporates are improving their disclosure around climate emissions – and the emissions themselves – but there is still much room for improvement, according to research from Barclays. The firm analysed 31 of the 50 largest Asian corporate emitters for the paper Asia 50: Further progress evidenced and found regulation is driving more organisations to … Read more