NGS Super joins Investor Agenda on climate change

NGS Super has joined more than 500 institutional investors around the world, a collective managing $35 trillion (USD) in assets, to call on governments to take greater action to tackle climate change and meet the 2020 Paris Agreement goals.

This is the largest ever group of investors to publicly call on global governments to phase out thermal coal power worldwide, put a price on carbon pollution, end government subsidies for fossil fuels, and update and strengthen nationally-determined contributions to meet the emissions reduction goal of the Paris Agreement by 2020.

The Global Investor Statement to Governments on Climate Change was developed by the seven founding partners of The Investor Agenda. While investors acknowledge a shift to clean energy is underway, much more needs to be done to build the resilience of global economies, societies and financial systems against the risks associated with climate change.

As a collective initiative, The Investor Agenda aims to accelerate and scale up investor actions worldwide that are key in the fight against climate change. It provides investors with a set of actions that they can take in four key focus areas: investment, corporate engagement, investor disclosure and policy advocacy.

Investing in climate action

The Investor Agenda also recently released its Annual Progress Report which revealed that nearly 1,200 investors worldwide have taken action in one or more of the four key focus areas of The Investor Agenda.

Encouragingly, more than 750 investors have engaged with or directly influenced portfolio companies to act on climate change, and more than 260 have set a climate target.

It is hoped that through the establishment and growth of a global network that investors can scale up the ambition and, importantly, action to make strides against climate change and prevent global average temperatures from rising beyond the 1.5-degree threshold.

NGS Super takes local initiative

At NGS Super, we recently announced that we were the first Australian superannuation fund to invest in a low-carbon portfolio designed by global asset manager AllianceBernstein.

We invested approximately $170 million in the AB Managed Volatility – Green Strategy (Green MVE) which aims to achieve a positive impact on climate change while still delivering attractive investment returns.

The Green MVE strategy takes an innovative approach through measuring carbon emissions and directly engaging with Australian companies. We believe that through that direct engagement with companies we can drive meaningful change from within and ultimately drive better climate outcomes. From an investment perspective, this approach also provides a deeper analysis of the climate related risks in our broader Australian equity portfolio.

Green MVE also provides us with a way to reduce the carbon intensity and risk of our portfolios, without impacting the expected returns of our members. We’re committed to sustainable long-term investment options that work to give our members the best retirement outcomes and will continue to push for the causes we believe in, such as greater action on climate change.

Find out more about our sustainability efforts here.