London Climate Action Week: How to overcome barriers to ensuring financial portfolios are free from deforestation-related activities

This event brought together a panel of speakers to discuss how the finance sector needs to end portfolio exposure to deforestation and scale finance to nature-positive opportunities. Through first hand accounts from those leading the way towards zero-deforestation portfolios, attendees gained insights into the mounting risks of inaction, the most impactful strategies, tools and data, and the connectivity between leading investor nature-related initiatives. They also learned about efforts to create an enabling policy environment, how to best make sense of new standards and regulations, and what is needed from policy-makers to drive more ambitious action. Table discussions allowed practitioners to brainstorm how to overcome the barriers to delivering deforestation-free finance.

Speakers included:

• Gemma Corrigan, Head of Policy and ESG Integration, Federated Hermes Limited
• Olga Hancock, Head of Responsible Investment, Church Commissioners for England
• James Hulse, Director of Hindsight Consultancy
• Niki Mardas, Executive Director of Global Canopy
• Emily McKenzie, Technical Director, Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD)
• Hans Mehn, Partner, Generation Investment Management
  Pei Chi Wong, Finance Sector Guidance Lead