1、 外文翻译 原文 The financial sector and climate change: risks, opportunities and overall preparedness. Material Source: Griffith University - Griffith Business School and Griffith University - School of Accounting, Banking and Finance Author: Mark Brimble and Jenny Stewart 1.0 Introduction The global fina
2、ncial crisis (GFC) has highlighted the importance of the financial sector, both nationally and internationally, for economic and political stability. This is drawn from the financial sectors role as a provider of capital, funds flow intermediator and provider of personal banking, risk and wealth man
3、agement services. Indeed, the underlying confidence (or lack thereof) in the system by its various participants underpins the modern economy. With discussions over the GFC now moving to regulatory and systemic response to mitigate the possibility of a future occurrence and improving the robustness o
4、f the global system, analysis of risk factors has begun. One such factor that, after taking a back-seat when survival mode kicked in during the crisis, has re-emerged is climate change. In Australia, policy attention has returned to this key social, environmental and economic issue with key legislat
5、ion being debated and the government reaffirming their intention to pursue a significant response to climate change. The financial sector stands to be significantly impacted by this regulatory response and the emergence of new markets, new investment opportunities and new reporting requirements. It
6、is now widely accepted that climate change is occurring and irrespective of ones beliefs around the cause and likely speed of change, the impacts are already being seen and will have a significant impact on the global environment and economy over the next 20-50 years (IPCC, 2007; NOAA, 2008; and Han
7、sen et al., 2007). It is argued that the responsibility for response to climate change is borne by all individuals and entities. Historically, however, the social role of a corporate was non-existent, with neo-classical corporate theory stating that the only objective is to maximize shareholder weal
8、th as famously articulated by Friedman (1962:133): “Few trends would so thoroughly undermine the very foundations of our free society as the acceptance by corporate officials of a social responsibility other than to make as much money for their shareholders as they possibly can”. Overtime, however,
9、this has been challenged both by the theorists and the practitioners, and one only has to examine the website of a major corporate to see the level of engagement in social and community activities that is occurring. Legitimacy theory provides a framework for this activity as it posits that businesse
10、s will seek to operate within the expectations of society and have society perceive the business as legitimate (Deegan, 2000). The critical element here is that societys perceptions determine legitimacy, and therefore organizations that are not perceived as having being sufficiently responsible face
11、 significant difficulties in maintaining business, hence providing the motivation to engage in socially responsibility activities and behaviors (Nsi, Nsi, Phillips and Zyglidopoulos, 1997). In terms of climate change, it then follows that organizations will seek to engage in activities that are seen
12、 as responsible in relation to climate change mitigation, to develop/maintain legitimacy in the eyes of society. This is consistent with the release of two parliamentary reports reaffirming corporate responsibility to stakeholders other than just shareholders, there has been a growing voluntary comm
13、itment amongst some sub-sectors of the industry to Environment, Social and Governance (ESG) issues. This paper seeks to understand how prepared the financial services sector is for climate change. To do so, we interview 25 senior financial sector staff across who are in sustainability related roles,
14、 in regards to their perceptions of the engagement of the sector to date, the risk and opportunities that climate change presents, what is required to create more engagement and build capacity to respond. This will provide a view from within the sector of the progress being made to date, what the pe
15、rceptions of what is required to accelerate the pace of response. We argue that this will be useful for all financial sector and climate change stakeholders as the sector will be a key player in the national climate change response. From a theoretical perspective, the paper will also provide a furth
16、er application of legitimacy theory while adding to the sparse academic literature on climate change and the financial sector. Our interview data illustrates the belief that climate change contains significant potential risk and opportunities for the financial sector. Furthermore, while the sector i
17、s aware of these, there is still a way to go to generate a sector wide response. Participants expressed concern that should the pace of engagement with the ESG agenda not accelerate, opportunities in capital attraction, skills development and retention, and thought leadership will be lost to foreign
18、 markets (particularly Europe). Consequently, the role of regulation to force and entice engagement in the short-term is critical. This suggests that legitimacy concerns in relation to climate change are either (1) not yet sufficient (participants report that many in the sector are yet to be convinc
19、ed of client demand for climate change related products and services, and/or they are not yet profitable); (2) has been overshadowed by the GFC; or (3) is mitigated by the size and influence of the financial sector. Finally, it is also noted that there are disparities across the subsectors, which po
20、int to a lack of a systematic industry wide approach. Overall the industry needs to be better prepared for climate change impacts and build capacity to respond, rather than wait to be directed by the government. The remainder of this paper is structured as follows. The next section provides a brief
21、discussion of the relevance of climate change to the financial sector in Australia. This is followed by the method and results in sections three and four. Section five contains concluding comments. 2.0 Sustainability and the Finance Sector Given that the financial sector is not a heavy polluter such
22、 as transportation, mining and heavy industry, one might initially think that that is of less relevance for climate change response. On closer examination, the importance of the sector for mitigation, and the degree to which it is impacted by climate change becomes apparent. The primary importance i
23、s drawn from the role of the sector as a provider of capital, with the process of capital provision/intermediation providing the sector with significant influence due to requirements for the provision of information, the direct costing of climate change risks/returns into valuation and pricing mecha
24、nisms, the placing of restrictive covenants and overall ability to refuse to provide capital. This serves to highlight to both business and consumer markets the impact of these issues as it begins to impact on the availability and price of capital for climate change influenced business/products/serv
25、ices/assets.3 In addition, it also acts to bring these issues to the attention of businesses and consumers and perhaps motivates them to engage in the process (in order to acquire capital or to minimize cost of capital). There is also a significant scale issue with significant pools of resources tie
26、d up with sustainability related pursuits which represent significant potential income sources for financial institutions. For example in July 2007 more than 200 global institutions, representing over US$9 trillion in assets under management had endorsed the UN Global Compact Principles for Responsi
27、ble Investment (PRI). It is also anticipated that significant capital will be allocated by business and government to climate change technology and research in future years. The political currency of climate change is a further issue as it is indicative of future policy directions. For example at th
28、e recent London Summit the G20 leaders released a statement that included pledges to build an inclusive, green, and sustainable economic recovery. Indeed, the government response in Australia has been clear with the ratification of the Kyoto protocol followed by other policies around reporting, rene
29、wable energy and carbon trading. Interestingly, the financial sector was the worst performer in terms of ESG reporting according to the 2008 EIRIS report with almost a quarter of financial institutions failing to disclose any evidence of ESG risk management - twice that of any other sector (EIRIS, 2
30、009). There is also growing membership of voluntary codes and industry standards in the finance sector which will potentially influence a range of processes and behaviors within the sector. Key examples of these include the PRI, the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) and the Global Reporting Initiative
31、 (GRI), all of which have a significant (and growing) number of Australian financial institutions as signatories. While the material impact of these on the signatories is yet to be established, the requirements of these standards/codes are potentially significant. For example, the recent ANZ bank wi
32、thdrawal from funding the Gunns Pulp Mill in Tasmania is widely seen as being related to ANZ being a signatory to the Equator Principles which provides a set of guidelines for banks with respect to managing social and environmental issues related to project financing? In summary, the financial secto
33、r does have a significant role to play in the process of climate change mitigation. This is highlighted by the influence it has on business and consumers, as well as the potential material impact that climate change may have on the sector. This paper, will provide further insight into these opportun
34、ities and risks, activity in the sector and what is required to extend engagement by examining the views of the sector in this regard. 3.0 Methodology This study uses semistructured interviews to investigate the preparedness of the financial services sector in Australia for climate change. Twenty-fi
35、ve senior members of the sector who are in sustainability related roles are interviewed to obtain their views on this issue. The participants were drawn from across the sector and include bankers, researchers, analysts, advisers, consultants and investment managers and senior managers. Due to the re
36、latively small population of such individuals and the potential sensitivity of the information provided, this process was strictly confidential and hence no demographic data on the participants is provided. The interviews were semi-structured and typically lasted an hour (range from 45-95minutes). T
37、he discussion guide was iteratively developed with senior policy staff from Finsia and pilot tested on several senior academics and practitioners for flow, clarity of purpose and questions. It contained nine questions that explored are range of issues including: 1. The background of the interviewee
38、2. Perceptions of the sectors engagement in sustainability and differing responses across subsectors 3. The impact of the government policy agenda 4. Perceptions of challenges, opportunities and risks for the sector in responding to climate change 5. Actions that are required to create further actio
39、n from the sector, including regulatory action. The interviews were recorded, transcribed and then subjected to thematic analysis on a question by question basis to extrapolate key themes and issues which are reported in the following sections. 4.0 Results 4.1 Extent of existing integration of susta
40、inability concerns When asked about the extent to which sustainability concerns had been already integrated into business practices, interviewees generally agreed that this varied considerably throughout the sub-groups in the sector. Interest and action was noted with specific examples of action ind
41、entified, however these were typically in specific products/services rather than a whole of institutional approach. Awareness, was also argued to be high, however interviewees agreed that this had not translated into action in many cases. Reasons offered for this include uncertainty in relation to r
42、egulation, a lack of leadership commitment, some bad experiences in terms of unprofitable initiatives, a lack of “ownership” within institutions, a detachment from day-to-day activities, uncertainty with respect to a connection to returns, a focus on short term remuneration incentives (both individu
43、al and wholesale), and a focus on short term portfolio (both investment and lending) performance. “Its the leading sector on sustainability, being led by the big banks. They have responded to crises in their own business in the 80s and 90s.” “There is divergence in organization behaviors and percept
44、ions.” “On the whole, on a limited level. It has probably been good at a housekeeping level, but on the whole, a lot more can be done.” In terms of the subsectors, there was agreement that the large banks appeared to be leading the way with three of the four major banks being recognised as global le
45、aders in their commitment to sustainability. Despite this, it was felt that there had been significant difficulties in operationalising the commitment, for example, with respect to lending practices and much work was required to bring it to the coal face. In regards to other sectors, superannuation
46、funds, particularly the industry funds, were generally recognised as leaders, taking an “ownership” perspective with more of a long term focus. Other fund managers and buy-side analysts were argued to still tend to behave like traders because of the focus on short term incentives. It was generally a
47、greed that the financial planning sub-sector is less prepared due to a lack of understanding, a perceived lack of interest from clients, their role being one of product receiver rather than driver/innovator, and being driven by returns to clients and reward structures that are incompatible with long
48、 term ESG issues. Stockbrokers and sell-side analysts are also less prepared for similar reasons. Investment bankers were seen as being driven by short term incentives, leading to an opportunistic approach. 译文 金融业和气候变化：风险，机遇和整体准备 资料来源 :格里菲斯大学 -格里菲斯商学院和格里菲斯大学 -会计，银行及金融学院 作者： 马克布林布尔和珍妮斯图尔特 1.0 引言 全球金融
49、危机（ GFC）突出了对于国内和国际的金融部门需要经济和政治稳定的重要性。这主要是 因为金融部门是资本提供者、资金流通的中介者和个人银行风险和财富管理的提供者。事实上，系统中的基本信任建立（或缺乏）通过各种参与者建立（或缺乏）支持现代金融。随着在全球金融危机的讨论，现在正在向监管和全身反应，以减轻未来发生的可能性，并提高了全球系统的鲁莽性，分析风险因素已经开始。一个这样的因素在生存模式脱离危机后再度出现的是气候变化。在澳大利亚，政策的注意力又回到这个关键的社会，环境和经济问题的关键立法正在辩论和政府重申他们打算继续对气候变化的显著的反应。财政部门对监管回应和新市场新投资机会和新报告需求的紧 急情况有重要影响。 现在人们普遍接受，气候变化正在发生的信念和无论周围的变化的原因和可能的速度，影响已经被人看 见，在未来 20-50 年（ IPCC， 2007 年， NOAA，2008;和汉森等人， 2007 年）将有一个重大影响。有人认为，为应对责任气候变化是承担所有个人和实体。从历史上看，但是，一个社会的作用企业是不存在的，具有新古典主义的理论，指出企业唯一的目标是最大限度地为著名的弗里德曼阐述（ 1962:133）股东财富：“很少趋势会为了一个企业的社会责任破坏我们的自由社会而不是为他们的股东尽可能的多赚钱。”然而，这一说法 被理论家和实践家，还有一
