With a closing window of opportunity to prevent irreversible climate change and biodiversity loss, and an urgent need to rebuild a fairer global economy in the wake of the pandemic, investors can no longer rely on a myopic focus on short-term gains. Investors are increasingly expected to go well beyond traditional notions of financial returns or liability matching and consider how their investments impact wider society and the environment.
This concept is illustrated in a new report, ‘Ripples of Responsibilities’, written by the Kempen-supported initiative FCLT (‘Focusing Capital on the Long Term’) - which likens investor responsibility to a rippling pond.
Short-term financial returns are where a stone drops in the water, but investments also create, and depend upon, the outer ripples of long-term value, healthy markets and a healthy planet. The FCLT study underlines that the way investors navigate these ‘ripples’ of responsibility has a tremendous effect on long-term success.