Responsible investments are high on our agenda
Janicke Scheele leads a dedicated responsible investment team consisting of five full time employees in DNB Asset Management. - Our job is, among other tasks, to work together with our Portfolio Managers to ensure the highest standards of ESG in our investments, she says.
If you’re not familiar with the acronym, ESG means taking into consideration environmental (E), social and governance (G) risks and opportunities in investments.
To make sure that our investments are in line with our Group Standard for Responsible Investments, our team analyses hundreds of companies each year, Scheele explains that at DNB we use research from external consultants as well as performing in-house research. And the investment universe is continuously screened.
The standards are implemented through active ownership engagement and ESG integration in investment decisions, in all our investments.
DNB is fully committed to integrating ESG in all assets
DNB has been working with responsible investments for a long time and has been a signatory to the UNPRI since its inception in 2006. Scheele makes the point that we are enhancing our work continuously and the growing demands from our customers indicate that the world is moving forward.
She firmly believes that returns are not sacrificed when material ESG factors are integrated into investment decision making.
On the contrary, she is convinced that integrating material ESG risks and opportunities conducted in the right way can safeguard long term returns.
How does the responsible investment team work?
The RI team’s work is focused around four pillars, Scheele explains: Active ownership through dialogues and voting, setting standards towards companies and industries, integration of material ESG factors in investment decisions and exclusions.
Where we find ESG issues in a company that we believe we can impact, our philosophy is always to influence through active ownership first, says Scheele.
However, if a company is in breach of our Standard for Responsible Investments, and shows no willingness to change, it will be excluded from our investment universe.