Responsible investment

We invest pension assets in a profitable, secure and responsible manner. We shoulder our responsibility for pension assets and for the adequacy of the financing of the pension system by ensuring the return generated by the pension assets and our solvency.

We consider ESG factors extensively in our investment activities: aspects affecting environmental (E), societal and social factors (S) as well as good governance (G). We believe that taking responsibility into consideration in investment activities mitigates risks and increases returns in the long term.

The framework for responsible investment at Veritas consists of our Principles of Responsible Investment, Climate Policy for investments, along with our Ownership Policy. In addition to this, we have signed the UN Principles of Responsible Investment (PRI) and report on the activity of our investment activities to PRI annually. We have been a signatory to PRI since 2012.

We have integrated responsible investment as part of our investment activities and it is, therefore, reflected in our practical everyday activities, when making our investment decisions. Furthermore, our Chief Sustainability Officer gives a weekly ESG review, to ensure the entire investment team is kept abreast of topical ESG themes.

Year 2021: expanded sustainability analysis and challenging reporting

In our 2020 corporate responsibility report we relayed that throughout 2021 we were planning on focusing on implementing our responsible investment targets and on improved responsibility analysis. We have, indeed, conducted a number of responsibility analyses and projects during the year both internally and with the aid of a third-party service provider. We have, for instance, examined ESG indices more thoroughly and commenced our transition towards low-carbon alternatives in our passive equity investments.

We monitor the actualisation of responsible investment annually by reporting to the PRI. Based on our reporting, PRI assesses our performance in responsible investment activities and scores our activities. In 2021, the reporting framework, along with its reporting tools, scores and assessment criteria were completely reformed. Reporting under the new framework and tool was challenging and we expended a substantial amount of resources on same.

The new PRI reporting tool was challenging also for PRI and caused significant delays for the entire assessment process: in late 2021, PRI communicated that owing to the deficiencies in the reporting tool, the reporting for 2021 will be delayed until 2022. Therefore, there will be no reporting for 2022 at all, and the next reporting to PRI will not take place until 2023.

Therefore, for reasons attributable to PRI, we are not yet in the position to report our scores for the PRI report. We will be publishing the scores as soon as we receive same from PRI and report on them in our next corporate responsibility report.

Goal 4: We develop our investment activities towards being increasingly responsible

Year 2022: sights towards biodiversity and expanded reporting

We keep a close eye on the developments in responsible reporting, and in 2022 we are planning on paying particular attention to the monitoring of biodiversity issues. Alongside climate change, matters pertaining to biodiversity are being increasingly highlighted by investors. Going forward, this will also require policy and reporting efforts from us, but before that, we are hoping for a global reporting framework and concrete indicators.

In addition to biodiversity, during 2022 we will also seek to expand our climate roadmap and climate reporting. We are endeavouring to gather increasing amounts of data concerning more and more asset categories and, thereby, to develop our operations and evolve constantly.