Standards for Financial ESG Products Too Lax

Since the financial industry committed itself to the U. N’s sustainable management and 2015 Paris Accord’s climate-change goals, we as consumers see press releases almost every day announcing the launch of a new ESG or impact product or a financial services company’s net-zero strategy. In other words, investment products with an ESG label or with a climate-change target may comply with sustainability guidelines, but do not have a measurable impact. There is no doubt that serious efforts are being made in the financial sector to put the global economy onto a more sustainable footing and to slash CO2 emissions. However, a company’s ESG the score is the result of variously weighted ESG factors. As a result, oil companies such as ExxonMobil or the tobacco multinational Philipp Morris or Coca Cola or Pepsi, whose products cause immense damage to health, achieve decent ESG scores. Read more