Robeco reflects on journey so far as UN celebrates 4th anniversary of SDGs
As the United Nations (UN) celebrate the fourth anniversary of the adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), Robeco reflects on the progress that has been made and the steps that still need to be taken.
As part of the wider 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, the UN SDGs are a call for action embedded in a set of 17 goals and a further 169 targets for government, business and society to collaborate on reducing inequality, eradicating poverty and protecting the environment.
Carola van Lamoen, Head of Active Ownership, at Robeco said, “The UN Sustainable Development Goals were established through one of the biggest stakeholder consultations ever and are now globally recognised as a blueprint for a better future.”
“The UN SDGs are now explicitly addressed in the engagement conversations we have with the companies we invest in, and we expect that engagement around sustainable development goals will become mainstream within the next five years.“
“Measurement of specific impact that invested companies have on the SDGs remains a challenge, but it’s developing. We, together with RobecoSAM have developed our own framework. Ultimately, I expect the industry to move towards a global harmonized SDG impact measurement system.”
RobecoSAM is among the first investment managers to construct an effective framework for mapping and measuring SDG contributions that can be applied across investment portfolios. This has been achieved by completing a mapping exercise of some 450 companies, grading them by positive and negative SDG contribution.
Robeco and RobecoSAM offer a range of SDG strategies in both equities and fixed income, including RobecoSAM Global SDG Equities, RobecoSAM Euro SDG Credits, and RobecoSAM SDG Credit Income. Most recently, in May 2018, Robeco and RobecoSAM announced the launch of RobecoSAM Global SDG Credits. This strategy, which uses RobecoSAM’s newly developed and proprietary SDG framework and builds on Robeco’s successful credit capability with its flagship global credit fund, has the twin aims of supporting the SDGs and outperforming the Bloomberg Barclays Global Aggregate Corporate Index.