A sustainable financial system on the agenda at Davos

The United Nations Environment Programme’s Inquiry into the Design of a Sustainable Financial System will present its interim report in Davos this week. The report has been initiated to advance policy options to improve the financial system’s effectiveness in mobilising capital towards a green and inclusive economy, and the interim report profiles innovations in five areas including institutional investment.

Here it explores policy changes in three broad areas: capital allocation, investor governance and market incentives in order to align the assets of institutional investors with sustainable development.

The report’s authors are positive about progress, saying that 2015 is poised to be the year of sustainable development, with growing focus on innovative policies to mobilise the trillions of dollars needed for long-term inclusive wealth creation.

The report identifies a number of high potential areas which could contribute to this shift including three major asset pools – banking, bond markets and institutional investors – as well as two emerging policy tools – monetary policy and ‘environmental stress tests’.

The UNEP Inquiry into Design Options for a Sustainable Financial System, now entering the second half of its two-year work program, was created to explore emerging changes and reforms to the financial system that would improve its alignment with sustainable development. Its investigations to date have revealed many innovations in financial and monetary policy, regulation and financial market standards.

The Inquiry is now half way through its work program and will complete its research and engagement at the end of 2015.

Sponsored Content

 

To access the report, Pathways to Scale, click below

 Inquiry – Pathways to Scale

Leave a Comment

Sort content by

Investors x embrace ethics

More than half of the world’s largest sovereign wealth funds, and around a third of the largest US state pension funds, have a disclosed code of ethics for their staff. According to the Public Fund Investment Policies 2015 annual review produced by the Ohio State University Moritz College of Law, a code of ethics helps

Shared fund objectives key to investor success

The practice of benchmarking the salaries of senior executives of institutional funds with reference to external financial services firms, instead of the shared objectives of the fund, is a major barrier to their success, according to Professor Gordon Clark of Oxford University and director of Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment. Clark sees the

PGGM halves CO2 footprint in investments

Ahead of the COP21 in Paris, the second largest Dutch fund with €161 billion ($160 billion), Pensioenfonds Zorg en Welzijn (PFZW), has announced it will halve the CO2 footprint of its investments by 2020. After an in-depth study with its fund manager, PGGM, the fund has decided its capital should be focused on companies that

Mercer’s seven tools for risk management reflect evolving landscape

Mercer Investments is using its deep insurance and environmental, social and governance (ESG) skills, contacts and processes to evolve its tools for advising clients on investment risk assessment, analysis and reporting – a move that reflects the evolving landscape for risk faced by investors. Partner and global head of responsible investment at Mercer, Jane Ambachtsheer,

OTPP advises on climate risk mitigation

Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan (OTPP), an investor known for its advanced risk-management tools and processes, considers that the common tools available to investors to mitigate carbon risk for investors – portfolio carbon footprints and thematic divestment – provide incomplete risk management. The fund has suggested macro- and microanalysis is necessary to understand a company’s complete

PRI to consider new principle focusing on systemic risks

The UN-backed Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI) is considering a seventh principle that will focus on broad financial system systemic risks. The six principles were written before the global financial crisis and are focused on environmental, social and governance (ESG) integration. Now, a decade after their creation, consideration of systemic risks is on the agenda and

Previous