News Archives » Faith Responsible Investing
2012 Fall/Winter JPIC Report Available November 8th, 2012
The Fall/Winter Issue of our bi-annual print newsletter is now available on-line. (Download the PDF)
This issue includes articles on Faith Consistent Investing, social justice education in Sri Lanka, campaigns against torture and the effort to ban conflict minerals, Oblate work in the Peruvian Amazon, faith-based principles for US immigration reform, JPIC network updates, the impact of climate change on the poor, the state of faith-based community organizing and the bountiful Oblate garden in Washington, DC.
We hope you enjoy this issue, and would welcome your feedback on the newsletter. Comments can be left below.
Interfaith Investors to Score Banks November 6th, 2012
The Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility, an influential investor coalition, will issue scorecards for the seven largest US banks next year, based on factors such as risk management and executive compensation.
The coalition has been influential in the field of corporate governance, pushing on issues such as “say on pay”, an advisory shareholder vote on executive compensation, which was included in the Dodd-Frank financial reform act.
ICCR has sent questionnaires to the seven largest US banks: Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Bank of New York Mellon, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan Chase, Morgan Stanley and Wells Fargo. Sustainalytics, a provider of environmental social governance research, is partnering on the research.
Reverend Séamus Finn of the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate said in the organisation’s annual report: “What is frustrating for many of us is the knowledge that the vast majority of these problems can be avoided by adopting the appropriate risk management safeguards and the requisite checks and balances. With each new scandal we think ‘maybe this time they will get it’, and then we open the morning paper to see that we still have work to do.”
Click here to read more »
Newsweek Green Rankings Companies Improve Environmental Transparency October 30th, 2012
The fourth annual Newsweek Green Rankings has found that 20% more of the world’s largest companies reported on their environmental performance in 2012, compared to 2011. The Newsweek Green Rankings aims to “cut through the green chatter and compare the actual environmental footprints, management (policies, programs, initiatives, controversies), and reporting practices” of the 500 largest publicly traded companies in the world. This is good progress; although the report also says more is needed to address the serious resource and sustainability issues facing us.
Global companies are becoming more transparent on their environmental performance, recognizing the risks inherent in a failure to attend to issues such as water and energy. Over 85% of companies in Newsweek’s Green Rankings now disclose some level of detail on their environmental information, representing a 20% improvement on the previous year.
Activist investors, like the Oblates of Mary Immaculate, engage corporations on sustainability issues and regularly encourage companies to report with mechanisms such as the GRI (Global Reporting Initiative), and the Carbon Disclosure Project on carbon and now water.
Newsweek partners with Trucost and Sustainalytics to engage companies in measuring and disclosing environmental performance as an essential first step towards improving it. The Oblates also use Sustainalytics to analyze their portfolio, and provide research guidance for engaging companies.
For more information see Newsweek Green Rankings on The Daily Beast
100 Years in the Amazon Basin October 18th, 2012
Fr. Seamus Finn OMI with Fr. Roberto Carrasco Rojas OMI in Iquitos, Peru
A recent trip to the Peruvian Amazon served to remind me of the vast expanse of the region and the great diversity that lives within its boundaries. While I was ready for the heat and humidity that Iquitos is known for, I was hardly prepared for the great network of major rivers that are an essential part of transportation in the region…
Read Fr. Seamus Finn’s latest post on Huffington Post
Engaging Corporations to Stop Human Trafficking October 17th, 2012
Human trafficking – the recruiting, transport, harboring or receiving of persons through force, coercion or fraud – targets vulnerable people who are then exploited through forced labor, bonded (debt) labor, prostitution or other sexual exploitation, or as child soldiers. It is a crime without borders; every country in the world has been touched by human trafficking, whether as a country of origin, transit, or destination for victims.
Thus begins an article on human trafficking describing the work of members of the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility (ICCR). “Leveraging Corporate Power in the Fight Against Human Trafficking,” explains how ICCR work on conflict minerals, the California Transparency in Supply Chains Act, and investor work around the London Olympics has helped to reduce the incidence of human trafficking, and to raise awareness of this heartbreaking issue.
Interested in more information on how corporations can address the issue? Read Corporate Strategies to Address Human trafficking, a joint publication of Christian Brothers Investment Services, ICCR and ECCR.
