As the global coronavirus pandemic continues to uproot our normal business, financial, economic and personal pursuits, questions that we could logically ask are (1) what impact does the virus crisis have on the ongoing corporate sustainability / ESG / citizenship efforts; and (2) what is the investor reaction – does the move into more sustainable / ESG investment vehicles continue?
Some answers come from Sanghamitra Saha, of Zack’s, writing in Yahoo Finance – “Here’s Why ESG ETFs Are Hot Amid Pandemic”.
Shorthand terms do matter – the “titling” of certain developments can sum up trends we should be tuning in to. Some examples for today: Sustainable Capitalism - Stakeholder Primacy – Sustainable Investing – Corporate Sustainability. Corporate ESG Performance Factors.
Since the “new world order” ushered in a new era in global trade some 30 years ago with the end of the Cold War, barriers to trade have continued to tumble. “GATT” (the “General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade” rounds of global trade talks that began in 1947) gave way to the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 1995. New rules were applied, and trade continued to become “more liberalized”. Corporate interests responded with dispersal of many their operations.
What might our world look like when the COVID-19 global emergency winds down and we move into the “recovery and restoration” phase? What is in store for business in the transition? And beyond? Looking at risk and opportunity through an ESG lens.
BNP Paribas Asset Management has offered up some important perspectives. ESG analyst Anupama Rames asks and answers: (1) Will the world go back to status quo when we exit the dis-location? (2) Probably not. “We believe,” she writes, “that the learnings from the go-remote experiment are here to stay.”
by Betsy Moszeter, Chief Operating Officer of Green Alpha Advisors
The evidence now shows that diverse investment teams make better long-term decisions.
The lack of gender diversity of financial services professionals is finally being talked about, but not sufficiently. It should be discussed more and in deeper ways, and – importantly – remediated in practice, because of the well-documented fact that heterogeneous teams outperform homogenous teams, across disciplines, and not by an insignificant amount.
As the coronavirus infections continued to spread into every corner of the globe, the players in three societal sectors moved into action – the public sector (governments), the private sector (in the main, corporations, public and private) and what the esteemed Professor Peter Drucker identified as the “Social” sector (i.e., not-for-profits, NGOs, academics, foundations, others).
by Julie Gorte, Senior Vice President for Sustainable Investing, Impax Asset Management LLC and Pax World Funds
Climate change is a story that encompasses everyone — believer, denier, rich, poor, black, brown, white, majority, minority, male or female. It’s an equal opportunity wolf at the door. But, as is the case with diversity in almost every pursuit, more diverse groups bring more to the table, and considering that climate change is the most important problem humans must solve, diversity has a contribution to make to climate change.
