The statement, Making Finance Work for People and Planet, notes that the world is facing urgent environmental and social challenges... Signatories [...] argue that investors have the ability to help mitigate these challenges and achieve the vision laid out by the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the Paris Agreement by applying more robust ESG due diligence. When they do, investors say, they are not only making a positive contribution to global sustainable development, they help achieve higher risk-adjusted returns and increase the robustness of corporate risk management as well.   

To this end, investors express support for the goals of the EU Action Plan on Financing Sustainable Growth, which calls for the mainstreaming of sustainability issues (also referred to as ESG issues) in investors’ risk management. They further note with enthusiasm recent developments indicating that the European Parliament and Council have reached a political agreement on a new set of rules known as the Disclosure of Sustainability Risks regulation, requiring European investors to carry out ESG due diligence and to disclose the steps they take to address the adverse social and environmental impacts of their investment decisions...