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Does Good Governance Lead to Better Investment Performance? (Commonfund)

The governance framework of an institution plays a significant role in its overall success. Based on our work with hundreds of higher education institutions over the past 50 years, we believe that good governance is critical to the health of the institution and the positive performance of the endowment. Most people intuitively agree that “good” governance is imperative but currently there is a dearth of quantitative research available that defines and measures the difference that it can make. To rectify this and help to move the industry forward, Commonfund Institute is embarking on a new research project titled, The Commonfund-FGA Benchmarking Study of Governance in Higher Education. 

The Study is the first of its kind and is being done in conjunction with Chris Merker and Fund Governance Analytics (FGA). FGA is a pioneer in the field of empirical governance research and evaluation of asset owners and operates in partnership with Marquette University. Their governance diagnostics are derived from decades of research and evaluation and have been used extensively to analyze the governance practices of public pension funds. This is the first time that these tools will be applied to higher education endowments.

https://www.commonfund.org/blog/does-good-governance-lead-to-better-investment-performance-in-higher-education-institutions

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Happy Earth Day!

No 2030 or 2040 pledges today, just a poem for reflection on this 52nd Earth Day.

Life is the simple thing we neglect every day. A day contains the time as we travel on our way. Time is the thing we lack in our lives. As we yearn to find our way through this phenomenon called life. We grow old in wisdom, yet are fragile in youth. We cannot escape the perils that seeks us with each move. We can embrace the seconds that the clock has, Or be the pawn forced by the master’s perilous hand.

– walkinverse (1/3)

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Carbon Capture is Key to Companies’ Net Zero Pledges (WSJ)

https://www.wsj.com/articles/carbon-capture-is-key-to-companies-net-zero-pledges-11615975780

Many companies’ plans to reduce their greenhouse-gas emissions to “net zero” rely heavily on technologies to capture carbon. Some are more speculative than others.

Nearly 1,400 companies have promised to cut their net carbon dioxide emissions to zero over the coming decades. So-called carbon offsets, where the gas is removed from the atmosphere, are central to many of these plans. The latest of the almost daily announcements: French oil giant Total said on Tuesday that it will plant a 40,000-hectare forest in the Democratic Republic of Congo to sequester 10 million tons of CO2 over 20 years.

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The climate clock is ticking and now, with Sky’s new coverage, it will make prime-time headlines (iNews)

https://inews-co-uk.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/inews.co.uk/opinion/columnists/the-climate-clock-is-ticking-and-now-with-skys-new-coverage-it-will-make-prime-time-headlines-933810/amp

Starting this week, Sky News will get deadly serious in its coverage of climate change by highlighting every night the time we have left until the planet overheats.

The figure is already less than 12 years, and the on-screen ticker will be counting down, second by second, as we head towards the ominous limit of 1.5°C hotter than when the Earth’s temperature was first comprehensively measured in 1880.

The figure is already less than 12 years, and the on-screen ticker will be counting down, second by second, as we head towards the ominous limit of 1.5°C hotter than when the Earth’s temperature was first comprehensively measured in 1880. That ceiling was set in Paris at COP21, the 2015 UN Climate Change Conference, and Sky News has made its bold statement as we approach COP26 in Glasgow in November.

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IFRS Foundation Trustees announce next steps in response to broad demand for global sustainability standards (IFRS Foundation)

Important announcement on global sustainability standards:

Given the growing and urgent demand, the intention would be for the Trustees to produce a definitive proposal (including a road map with timeline) by the end of September 2021, and possibly leading to an announcement on the establishment of a sustainability standards board at the meeting of the United Nations Climate Change Conference COP26 in November 2021.

https://www.ifrs.org/news-and-events/2021/02/trustees-announce-next-steps-in-response-to-broad-demand-for-global-sustainability-standards/

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Valuing Natural Capital – A Discussion with Pavan Sukhdev (Sustainability Leaders Podcast)

In this episode, Michael Torrance speaks with Pavan Sukhdev, an internationally recognized authority on the integration of sustainability impact and natural, human and social capital into accounting and disclosure for the private sector. They discuss how natural capital is defined, different disclosure frameworks, and how companies should approach this subject.

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/valuing-natural-capital-a-discussion-with-pavan-sukhdev/id1460595264?i=1000509213074

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TCFD View of Materiality No Longer Adequate – UNEP FI Chief (ESG Investor)

TCFD View of Materiality No Longer Adequate – UNEP FI Chief

Usher calls for double materiality approach in ESG investment decision making.

The materiality definition adopted by the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) is insufficient in serving the battle against climate change, Eric Usher, the Head of UN Environment Programme Finance Initiative (UNEP FI), said today.

Speaking at the Climate Risk and Green Finance Regulatory Forum, Usher explained that the TCFD was established initially by the Financial Stability Board (FSB) with the aim of ensuring financial stability, rather than climate stability.

This “exclusive focus” on systemic risk to the finance sector resulted in a “short-term outside-in approach to materiality” that would not drive real-world change, Usher suggested.

“What we need to add is inside-out leadership, focusing on the impact of financing [on] the targeted outside dimension, which aligns financing and financial portfolios with societal objectives, such as keeping the climate within 1.5 degrees of warming,” he said.