Our knowledge resources reflect the breadth and depth of our expertise, our insight into the issues which matter to your business, and our understanding of the markets in which you operate.
While in recent months the approaching COP26 has been occupying the bulk of government and media attention, the 15th meeting of the UN Conference of the Parties ("COP15") to the Convention on Biological Diversity ("CBD") is also due to take place in 2021, which is seen by many as being just as critical to the future of the planet.
A regular briefing for the alternative asset management industry.
Last week, the EU unveiled its 'Fit for 55' proposals, which if adopted would substantively revise the EU's climate and energy policies in order to enable a net greenhouse gas emissions reduction by at least 55% by 2030, compared to 1990 levels.
Welcome to the first in our series of podcasts focusing on international employment law.
Chancellor Rishi Sunak has hinted that new sustainability reporting requirements are on the horizon for pension schemes, financial services firms and their investment products.
On 24 June 2021, the UK's Climate Change Committee ('CCC') delivered a report on the UK's progress in reducing emissions and adapting to climate change. This report followed the CCC's damning climate risk report (read our briefing here) just a week earlier.
A regular briefing for the alternative asset management industry.
On 16 June 2021, the UK Committee on Climate Change ('CCC') issued its third report on the state of the UK's preparedness for the risks and opportunities of climate change impacts. "Climate change adaptation", changes that allow us to prepare for and live with the inevitable impacts of climate change, is recognised as, in some respects, as important as climate change mitigation, or actions to reduce the scale and speed of climate change itself.
In addition to COVID-19, climate change was one of the headline issues at the G7 summit in Cornwall over the weekend of 11-13 June 2021. The leaders of some of the world's richest nations, whose average carbon footprint per person is thought to be double the global average (triple for the US and Canada), made several climate-focused pledges, but critics claim that the detail of how to achieve them, and the finance needed to do so, were both missing.
A regular briefing for the alternative asset management industry.
On 22 and 23 April 2021, US President Joe Biden hosted a global two-day international climate summit to formally mark the US' return to the Paris Agreement (the "Climate Summit"). The Climate Summit's focus was on starting conversations around how to address the climate crisis in practice, including emission reductions, carbon trading, finance, innovation and job creation, in advance of more formal talks at COP26 later this year. It was the first time in four years that the US government has hosted a major international climate discussion, sending a strong signal to the rest of the world that the US is serious again about tackling climate change.
On 20 April the UK Government announced that it would significantly increase its climate ambition, ahead of the COP26 international climate summit in Glasgow in November. The UK's Climate Change Act commits it to net zero by 2050, and it recently adopted a new Nationally Determined Contribution ("NDC") under the Paris Agreement of 68% reduction against 1990 levels by 2030.
A regular briefing for the alternative asset management industry.
COP26 is the 26th session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). The summit will be attended by the heads of state of the countries that signed the UNFCCC, as well as a variety of climate experts and campaigners, in order to agree and accelerate action on the Paris Agreement. The UK, in partnership with Italy, is hosting the summit this year in Glasgow from 1 - 12 November 2021 after it was delayed by a year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The UK is centre stage in the lead up to COP26. As host, the UK will be tasked with trying to build consensus at the summit to ensure its success, but there has already been some criticism of the UK's approach to COP26 from certain stakeholders.
While the Paris Agreement certainly represents the most important part of the international effort to alleviate the impact of climate change, there is also increasing recognition that the business world needs to play a central role in meeting net zero, as industrial activities are the biggest contributor to rising temperatures on the planet. The World Bank estimates that $4 trillion of finance needs to be mobilised annually to invest in mitigation and resilience in the Global South, and most of this needs to be financed by the private sector.
BNP Paribas, the largest bank in France, has announced today that it will no longer finance firms who produce, or buy, beef or soybeans from land in the Amazon that was cleared or converted after 2008 (and will encourage its clients not to produce or buy beef or soybeans from cleared or converted land in the Cerrado after 1 January 2020).
The sustainability agenda is inevitably resulting in a wave of new regulation for alternative asset managers as well as the wider business community, a trend which looks set to continue in the coming years.
A regular briefing for the alternative asset management industry.