Mankind faces interconnected challenges. Great pressures on our environment and social infrastructure have grown out of an economic system that fails to acknowledge value outside of economic expansion and financial return. Overcoming these challenges requires a radical transition toward a sustainable system that respects our planet’s ecological balance and works for the benefit of all.

In light of this, Triodos Investment Management has launched a whitepaper, ‘Impact investing through listed equities and bonds’. The whitepaper explores global megatrends and sustainability challenges, and presents how Triodos Investment Management has distilled these into seven transition themes to drive positive impact through equities and bonds.  

Triodos Investment Management’s Socially Responsible Investment strategy invests in listed equities and bonds of companies and organisations that our investment team has identified as materially contributing to the transition toward a sustainable society. As such, its impact equity and bond funds go beyond conventional environmental, social and governance (ESG) screens and norms-based exclusions to ensure that portfolio construction is positively driven by solutions to global sustainability challenges.

Hans Stegeman, Head of Research and Investment Strategy: “The sustainable investment community needs to deepen its accountability. It is not enough to invest in ESG best-in-class companies that, within their sector, may be least damaging. To truly invest for a sustainable future, we need to invest in companies that actively contribute to solving our most pressing sustainability challenges.”

Company ESG ratings and normative screens have been instrumental in facilitating swift market adoption of ‘do no harm’ and risk-return optimisation strategies. However, few realise that these approaches are plainly ineffective at actually steering capital toward companies that intentionally use their resources and influence to catalyse transition towards sustainable solutions. It is time for the investment community to accept its responsibility and to acknowledge that every investment has an impact on our society; including investments in listed equities and bonds.

The whitepaper ‘Impact investing through listed equities and bonds; investable transition themes for a sustainable future’ addresses the phenomenon of impact investing through equities and bonds, and its role as a catalyst in achieving a paradigm shift.

Please download the paper here.