Climate-related corporate disclosures are the next big thing in fostering the transition to a net-zero carbon economy. A recent report by the Group of Thirty emphasised that the disclosure of comparable metrics will allow the financial system to systematically allocate capital to more sustainable and climate-resilient technologies and companies. But more needs to be done to encourage firms to disclose their climate-related risks and to improve the quality of disclosures, to ensure that best practice is harmonised across countries.

The recent consultation paper on climate-related disclosures published by the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) Foundation marks an important step in the process toward achieving these goals.

In response to the publication of this paper, the Qatar Centre for Global Banking and Finance at King’s is holding a policy forum that will bring global experts, regulatory authorities and academics together to debate the issues and inform the IFRS in its deliberations how to proceed. The event will be recorded and submitted as a response to the IFRS Foundation’s consultation.

Questions for discussion will include:

• What principles are needed to guide the development of consistent and comparable climate disclosures?
• What information is needed by asset managers to harness the demand for climate-linked passive funds?
• What are the barriers to providing and assuring this information?
• What role should the IFRS Foundation play vis-à-vis other bodies in developing standardised climate-related disclosures?

10.00 - Keynote Address

Lord Adair Turner, Chair, Energy Transitions Commission and Senior Fellow INET

10.30 - Introduction on the issues raised in the IFRS consultation paper

Prof Lucrezia Reichlin (London Business School and Trustee of the IFRS Foundation)

10.45 - Panel 1: What are the goals of harmonised sustainability reporting & what principles should guide its development?

• Speakers: Morgan Slebos (Principles for Responsible Investment), Dr Paul Fisher (Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership), Dr Megan Bowman (King's College London)

11.15 - Panel 2: What information is needed by stakeholders?

• Chair: Prof Martin Weale (King's College London)
• Speakers: Luba Nikulina (Willis Towers Watson), Morgan Despres (Network for Greening the Financial System)

11.45 - Panel 3: What are the barriers to providing and assuring climate disclosures?

• Chair: Richard Monks (Financial Conduct Authority)
• Speakers: Spencer Dale (BP), Wim Bartels (KPMG)

12.15 - Panel 4: Governance for global standards & the potential role of the IFRS Foundation

• Chair: Prof Frans Berkhout (King's College London)
• Speakers: Clara Barby (Impact Management Project), Prof Lucrezia Reichlin (London Business School and Trustee of the IFRS Foundation), Sheldon Mills (Financial Conduct Authority & Co-Lead of The International Organization of Securities Commissions (IOSCO) Sustainability Task Force)

Click here to register today and join the discussion!

Lord Adair Turner chairs the Energy Transitions Commission, a global coalition of major power and industrial companies, investors, environmental NGOs and experts working out achievable pathways to limit global warming to well below 2˚C by 2040 while stimulating economic development and social progress.

Morgan Slebos is the Director of Sustainable Markets at the United Nations-supported Principles for Responsible Investment. He leads the PRI’s sustainable financial system and driving meaningful data work areas. Morgan has extensive experience in the financial sector, including previous roles as policy manager for resource and environment issues at the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries and as an advisor at the Association of British Insurers.

Dr Paul Fisher currently chairs the London Bullion Market Association, is a NED at the UK Debt Management Office, provides consultancy services to central banks and spends about half his time on academic work, including climate change. He is also a visiting professor at the London Institute of Banking and Finance, and at Richmond, the American International University in London. In 2017/18 he was a member of the High-Level Experts Group on Sustainable Finance at the European Commission and the UK Green Finance Task Force.

Dr Megan Bowman joined King’s in August 2015 and has been appointed a Dickson Poon School of Law ‘Rising Star’. Her expertise focuses on transnational analyses of climate finance, commercial and financial regulation, and corporate ethics. She is motivated by regulatory design options that account for the levers and limits of law in facilitating sustainability in market economies and China.

Prof Martin Weale is Professor of Economics at King's Busines School. Martin graduated in 1977 in Economics from Clare College, Cambridge. On graduating he took up an Overseas Development Institute Fellowship at the National Statistics Office in Malawi. He returned to Cambridge in 1979 to work on economic modelling projects directed by Sir Richard Stone and Professor James Meade, before becoming an Assistant Lecturer in 1987 and subsequently a Lecturer in the Faculty of Economics and Politics. He was elected a Fellow of Clare College in 1981.

Luba Nikulina has 24 years of investment experience and leads the global research function at Willis Towers Watson's Investment business. Her team includes more than a hundred investment professionals around the world responsible for conducting economic and capital markets research, evaluating asset management firms in a variety of different asset classes, coming up with investment recommendations and creating new investment solutions where there is demand from asset owners but no solutions exist.

Morgan Despres is Deputy Head of the Financial Stability Department at the Banque de France and also serves as the Head of the Network for Greening the Financial System (NGFS) Secretariat. He joined the Banque de France in 2005 and served in the Payment and Settlement Systems Department and as Deputy Head of the Macroprudential Division.

Richard Monks is the Director of Strategy at the FCA. Richard has over 15 years’ experience in Financial Regulation, including roles in Supervision, Policy, Enforcement and as Private Secretary to former FSA Chairman, Lord Turner. Richard is responsible for setting the FCA Strategy, allocating FCA resource and for delivering cross-cutting strategic policy, such as climate change and inter-generational issues.

Spencer Dale is group chief economist of BP Plc. He manages BP’s economics and energy insights team which provides advice and analysis on the global energy system, the energy transition and the evolving nature of the energy system as it moves to net zero. The economics and energy insights team are responsible for producing BP’s annual Statistical Review of World Energy and BP’s Energy Outlook.

Wim Bartels is KPMG’s Global Leader for Climate-related Risk Services, and also Partner for Corporate Reporting at KPMG in the Netherlands. He is a member of the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD), which has developed guidance to help companies understand and disclose their financial exposure to climate-related risks.

Prof Frans Berkhout is Executive Dean of the Faculty of Social Science & Public Policy and Professor of Environment, Society and Climate at King’s College London. He joined King’s in 2013. He was previously Director of the Future Earth programme, based at the International Council for Science (ICSU) in Paris, and Director of the Institute for Environmental Studies (IVM) at the VU University Amsterdam in The Netherlands.

Clara Barby oversees the strategic direction of the IMP’s activities and leads its technical facilitation across a broad community of collaborating organisations. Clara has led the IMP since inception in 2016. She is on secondment from her role as a Partner at Bridges Fund Management, where she previously led the firm’s sustainable and impact investing strategies across all fund types. Clara also led the firm’s research and development efforts to promote the growth of the wider sustainable and impact investment sector. 

Prof Lucrezia Reichlin is Professor of Economics at the London Business School, non-executive director of AGEAS Insurance Group as well as Chairman & co-founder of Now-Casting Economics Ltd and a Trustee of IFRS. She is a columnist for the Italian national daily Il Corriere della Sera and a regular contributor of Project Syndicate.

Sheldon Mills is the Interim Executive Director of Strategy and Competition at the FCA. He is responsible for policy, strategy, competition, economics, market intelligence, consumer issues, and FCA Innovate. Sheldon is a qualified solicitor and has practiced law at King & Wood Mallesons and Jones Day, counselling a range of UK and international clients in antitrust and competition law. He holds undergraduate and postgraduate law degrees from King’s College, London and was born and raised in Cardiff, Wales.