Oct 19, 2011, Washington DC — Cala Social Capital, founded by Fr. Ross Collins, is a UK-based social enterprise which aims to promote the development of microfinance in the developing world through the vast network of the Anglican Church. They are partnering with Mike Sherry, finance director of Grass Roots Group UK, to create environmentally-oriented microfinance projects in Tanzania. Fr. Collins estimates that 90% of their constituents in Tanzania will be women, and hopes to roll out projects in other African countries in 2013.

Washington DC, Oct 20 2011 — Mr. Andrew Mitchell, founder and executive director of the Global Canopy Programme, is on an important mission to stop global deforestation, which destroys whole ecosystems and diminishes biodiversity, emits greenhouse gases into an already warming atmosphere, and denies other ecosystem services such as water purification to animal and plant populations and, of course, to we humans.

He is working with governments and financial institutions to develop an economic framework that keeps forests alive.  As things stand now, forests are worth more dead than alive.  He discusses his hopes for a forest carbon compliance market via REDD+, tapping into the global bond market to raise $17 billion via forest bonds for developing sustainable agribusiness, and the many complexities inherent in reaching a true valuation of the natural capital derived from forests.

Interested in green bonds?  Access the GCP’s publication on forest bonds here: http://www.globalcanopy.org/materials/unlocking-forest-bonds.

Recorded at the UN Environment Programme Finance Initiative Global Roundtable.

Washington DC, Oct 20 2011 — Mrs. Mary Robinson, the first woman President of Ireland, former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, and Chair of the Mary Robinson Foundation for Climate Justice, headlined a panel on effective human rights due diligence for the financial industry at the UN Environment Programme Finance Initiative Global Roundtable.

She was joined by human rights policy experts from Barclays Bank, Calvert Investments, Oxfam America, the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, and the Kenan Institute for Ethics.  The panelists provided a thoughtful counterpoint to other Roundtable sessions focused on investment returns, insurance risk, and sustainable technologies.

Mrs. Robinson urged financial institutions to scale up efforts to translate the UN Guiding Principles for Business and Human Rights into effective due diligence actions.

The UN News Service writes:

Under the ‘State Duty to Protect,’ the guiding principles recommend how governments should provide greater clarity of expectations and consistency of rules for business in relation to human rights.

The ‘Corporate Responsibility to Respect’ principles provide a blueprint for companies on how to know and show that they are respecting human rights.

The ‘Access to Remedy’ principles focus on ensuring that where people are harmed by business activities, there is both adequate accountability and effective redress, judicial and non-judicial.

In response to JEI’s question about the linkages she has witnessed between climate change and the refugee population, Mrs. Robinson responded in terms acknowledging the need to achieve climate justice for displaced populations, noting specifically the situation in Somalia.  She also emphasized the need to educate and empower women in developing countries to enable them to make informed reproductive choices.

All credit to UNEP FI for balanced programming.

Oct 19, 2011, Washington DC — Mr. Philip Moss, managing director of Mana Ventures, a clean tech platform based in Geneva and Abu Dhabi, spoke with the JEI about catalyzing clean tech and renewable energy projects in the Middle East/North Africa region.  He also relates his experience working with the Masdar initiative of the Abu Dhabi government, responsible for building Masdar City, a low-carbon city that aims to be one of the most sustainable urban centers in the world.  Run on solar energy, built with reduced-impact materials, and even including an underground, driverless transport system, Masdar City is collaborting with blue-chip tech companies to move the region away from fossil fuel dependency.

Do you work at the forefront of clean tech innovation?  Apply for the $4 million Zayed Future Energy Prize managed by Masdar.

Recorded at the UN Environment Programme Finance Initiative Global Roundtable.

Oct 20 2011, Washington, DC — Mr. Gordon Brown, Member of Parliament and former UK Prime Minister, addressed a full audience of investors, asset managers, and corporate executives this morning at the UN Environment Programme Finance Initiative Global Roundtable.

Speaking on the current malaise in the european financial system, Mr. Brown enumerated ‘four deadly sins’ that the EU still has not corrected: inadequate injection of capital; incomplete removal of toxic assets from balance sheets; insufficient lending to businesses; and financial accounting standards lacking in transparency.

According to Mr. Brown, european countries are competing with each other in a race to the bottom: lowering standards ever farther to attract investors and financial institutions to their country.

Another strategic point governments have in common across the globe apparently is their plan to raise themselves out of economic sluggishness by increasing exports.  Listing countries in Europe, Asia, and North and South America, Mr. Brown relates their shared export-promotion plans, concluding, ‘unless there is another planet out there I’m not aware of that will purchase all these exports, and pay for them in dollars or euros, this strategy won’t work’.

For more Roundtable news in 140 characters or less, check our Twitter feed: http://twitter.com/#!/The_JEI.

Washington, DC, Oct 18 2011 — Editor-in-Chief Angelo Calvello and Board Member Christine Chan from the Journal of Environmental Investing (JEI) attended the opening reception of the UN Environment Programme Finance Initiative (UNEP FI) Global Roundtable on financial and market stability. The reception took place behind the glittering windows of the Newseum on Pennsylvania Avenue, an apposite setting, as the finance managers within were there to make, discuss, and report news about market-transforming, sustainable financing.

This year’s theme for the Roundtable is ‘The Tipping Point: Sustained Stability in the Next Economy’.  UNEP FI writes “More than 100 speakers will consider the emerging role of sustainable finance in reforming the financial sector to ensure greater long-term stability in the world economy.  The most forward-looking global economic pathfinders will shine a light on their groundbreaking ideas for establishing a strong and stable economic future.”

Special sessions will address sustainability reporting, forest carbon markets, green jobs initiatives, green building and property investing, water risks for capital markets, natural capital accounting, and integrating sustainability into investment portfolios, among other topics.

To provide tangible reminders of the assets that sustainable finance is meant to address, towering botanical creatures strolled among participants at the Newseum.

JEI worked with Paul Clements-Hunt, the executive director of UNEP FI, to obtain media partner status during the Roundtable.  For more information about the Roundtable, visit http://www.unepfi.org/grt/.  For daily news and interviews from the Roundtable, check back here.