Edward Longhurst-Pierce

It is a great time to be looking at how we can mitigate our impact on the world and the contribution that Brazil is making to less impactful ways of farming and forestry management, and of course to CO2 absorption and a net zero target through carbon credit production and sale. #brazil #naturebasedsolutions #carboncredits #CO2 #agriculture #forestry #sustainableagriculture #sustainableforestry #carbonoffsets

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Today marks a pivotal moment in the UK's democracy: the General Election 2024. As citizens exercise their right to vote, we witness the power of democracy in action. Let's engage in this democratic process with responsibility and thoughtfulness, casting our votes for the future we envision for our country. Regardless of political affiliations, let's unite in our commitment to shaping a better tomorrow for all. Every vote counts, and together, we can chart a course towards progress, unity, and prosperity. #UKGeneralElection #DemocracyInAction #YourVoteMatters 🗳️🇬🇧

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An important speech from Sasha Mills, highlighting where financial market infrastructures (FMIs) should be focusing their efforts to build operational resilience. Given how crucial FMIs are - facilitating millions of transactions across both financial markets and the wider economy every day - it's essential that we can rely on them to respond and recover effectively when operational disruption hits!

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https://lnkd.in/dPhXgJ37 Looking forward to hearing from Martin Dietz, PhD , Adele Ray (nee McGowan)and Jesal Mistry from Legal & General about how they are dealing with #privatemarkets and bringing them into the investment strategies for their 5.2 million DC savers. Join us today at 2pm to hear more, ask questions and share your views. Link attached

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Fascinating to learn about the appeal of Europe to north American fund managers and hear reflections on the findings of Ocorian’s recent survey amongst managers looking to prospect in Europe, Jon Spencer 👇 👏 💡 🌎   #NorthAmericanFundsInEurope

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Please do complete the survey, if you can. Policy making is only as good as the evidence its based on, and the survey helps provide valuable data on DC asset allocation.

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A useful summary of the importance of Op Resilience and the challenges ahead in the year #resilience #risk

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Delighted to share today’s EY UK Attractiveness Survey – Scotland 2024, with Scotland confirmed as the top UK location outside London for Foreign Direct Investment. With 142 projects last year, our international arm Scottish Development International, based in 23 countries, is bringing some of the best companies from around the world to Scotland. Working across the public sector, with academia and industry, our Team Scotland approach provides the support that enables companies to set up and scale across Scotland. For the first time in six years, utility supply projects are the top category in Scotland, due to increasing levels of low-carbon and ‘cleantech’ investment. Bringing innovative, scaling companies from around the world to work alongside dynamic and ambitious homegrown Scottish companies is helping transform our economy. https://lnkd.in/e98acWfM #InwardInvestment #FDI #EnergyTransition

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How are investors resourcing #stewardship? Are they aligning resources with their ambitions, fiduciary duty, beneficiary interest and client mandates? The Principles for Responsible Investment commissioned the Thinking Ahead Institute (TAI) to look into this issue, and this work has just been released.   Key takeaways: 👉 TAI estimates that the industry needs to double stewardship resources over time to meet the increased demands and needs. Global survey respondents allocated around 7% of their total investment resources to stewardship. The industry average is likely to be lower. 👉 A Stewardship Resources Assessment Framework​ including a client/manager discussion guide have been designed to help Asset Owners understand resourcing practices and have productive conversations with asset managers, demonstrate to asset managers that resource levels are being monitored, provide a reference point for requests to grow stewardship resources, and help organisations self-assess their resource levels. 👉 A Stewardship Resourcing Metric​. The report provides a structured approach to arrive at a Stewardship Resources Metric (SRM), which allows investors to calculate: 1) FTE-based stewardship estimation adjusted for seniority, and 2) specialist third party stewardship costs. Download the reports here: https://lnkd.in/dC6ZNy-H Congrats Clara MELOT, Josephine Notaras, Emmet McNamee, Paul Chandler, René van Merrienboer for your many months' work on this! Tom Attwooll , Carly M. Jacobs, CFA (Greenberg),Junru Liu, Rik Teeuwen, Antonio Santoro, Federica Rampinini, Anna Skrivanou, Victor Grenaudier Abi Curtis Matthew McAdam Cambria Allen Ratzlaff Rose Easton Duncan Smith Kazuma Osaki #esg #responsibleinvestment

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Interesting editorial today on the (absence of) #climate in the #GeneralElection debate It calls, among other things, for politicians to raise their ambition and for the next UK government to "face down the cynics and lobbyists." I have great news for the next government. Your voters agree. Climate Outreach's Britain Talks Climate found that people are crying out for more bold leadership - they want politicians to chart a path we can all follow to net zero. They want this to feel like a collective mission - like creating the NHS - not something we are left to face alone. And people want to be part of it. There is an urgent need to involve people in this transition in a way we simply haven't yet. Properly informing, listening to, engaging with people on #climate is a massive opportunity. We want to try and help whoever forms the next government get this right. It's too important not to. https://lnkd.in/gUMuYNyP

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The increasing wealth divide in the UK and extent of deep poverty have not really figured much in the current election campaign, so I was particularly keen to chair this Religion Media Centre briefing to try to redress the balance. Speakers representing faith charities describe the “deep poverty” in society, with many families unable to find enough support to even afford the essentials. There is some blue-sky thinking too, as some speakers argue that the current model of state support with charities picking up the pieces showed the system really had failed. They say there is a need for a root-and-branch approach to social inequality. It's a complex issue which defies simple solutions but unless it's tackled head-on, speakers feel things are unlikely to improve.

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Our latest Substack article focused on all the cash sitting on the overall balance sheets of UK households and corporates. Other recent Substack articles have examined the ECB's possible reaction to further potential spread widening, and the potential for a repricing in the UK curve. #rachelreeves #ukeconomicoutlook #frenchpolitics #ecb #boe

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An excellent course with INSEAD Executive Education to support professional development.

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Investors have an incredible opportunity to drive the climate transition by proactively delivering adaptation and mitigation strategies into developing countries. Collaboration is vital to success so come and join us and a select group of investors who are taking part in #LCAW2024 to be leaders in this space. #BeTheChange

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The Church of England Pensions Board has today published our 2023 Stewardship Report, focusing on four key themes: Systemic Stewardship, Investing for a Sustainable World, Investing For a Just World, and Good Governance. This is the 4th stewardship report produced by the Board and submitted to the Financial Reporting Council and to our scheme members. 'It is the most comprehensive in detailing the approach of the Board and the impact we seek through our stewardship of the assets entrusted to us,” said Clive Mather, Board Chair. “Ethical and responsible investment is at the heart of our approach and trustee decision-making.” In 2023 the Board’s growth assets returned 7.3%. Key highlights from 2023 include: Systemic Stewardship: ✔ Continued to lead global change on safety of mining waste with first mining companies reporting on conformance with the Global Standard and further companies committing to implement the Standard. ✔ Launched the $11 trillion USD backed Global Investor Commission on Mining 2030 to establish a consensus on the role finance has in realising a vision of a socially and environmentally responsible mining sector. ✔ Developed a Sustainability Charter for the approx. £50 billion per annum, bulk annuity market. Good Governance: ✔ Cast 17,623 votes at AGMs and undertook over 1,000 engagements with companies. ✔ Supported 64% of shareholder resolutions. ✔ Voted against management on executive pay at 40% of companies. ✔ Engaged all our managers under the Asset Owner Diversity Charter (AODC) programme. Investing for a Sustainable World: ✔ In 2023, the Board further reduced the weighted carbon intensity of its portfolio by 36%. The Board has reduced portfolio carbon intensity overall for the assessed asset classes by 71% since 2019, and this is well ahead of our 2030 medium term portfolio target. ✔ Secured commitment from National Grid to review of their climate lobbying in line with the Global Standard on Responsible Climate Lobbying. As a result of the work the Board, led together with Sjunde AP-fonden, AP7 and BNP Paribas, 34.7% of the 167 companies engaged by CA100+ now regularly review and report on their corporate climate lobbying.  ✔ Co-Chaired the ASCOR initiative & developed the first public assessments of 25 countries’ climate opportunities and risks. Investing for a Just World: ✔ Increased the scope of our focus on Living Wage accreditation-related voting expanded in 2023 to cover the breadth of the UK’s 350 largest companies. ✔ Served as a member of the UK Govt Work and Pensions Taskforce on Social Factors alongside other pension industry stakeholders. The Board played an active role in shaping the Taskforce’s guidance document. ✔ Deepened our involvement with several collaborative initiatives on human rights including participation in the PRI Advance initiative. https://lnkd.in/eWCPMqg5

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Delighted to have AiiM Partners and the incredible Shally Shanker in our portfolio at Heading for Change. This article highlights their work at the forefront of advancing climate solutions. Appreciate how Shally and team have an approach that is deep-rooted in climate and science, and wherein they integrate a broader gender and inclusion lens to advance better financial and social outcomes. Given our thesis of accelerating climate and biodiversity solutions with women as agents of change, here's to Shally and her team- and all they are doing at this nexus 🙌 More here: https://lnkd.in/dJSmmppk

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