The landscape for sustainable investments has undergone a seismic shift since we launched our Global Sustainable Equities strategy three years ago in 2018. The defiance of Extinction Rebellion and the bravery of #metoo triggered initial movement in awareness and action on planet and people. We launched our strategy just as David Attenborough’s footage of an albatross feeding plastic to its young provoked a moral moratorium on single use plastic across the world. Greta Thunberg soon became a household name with her sustained campaign on global warming, laying the groundwork for an address to the UN Climate Action Summit in September 2019 and catalysing greater policy action.

We saw tremors of departure from the shareholder primacy model, with the Business Roundtable in the United States strategically placing all stakeholders on an equal footing with shareholder return. The statement was signed by 181 CEOs, including some of the largest companies in the world. Within two years, the SEC has responded with a much needed dedicated Taskforce to seek misalignment of statement and intent of corporations. Across the water, the UK required listed companies to set out publicly how their directors have considered the interests of wider stakeholders. The European regulator has sought to scaffold trust with new SFDR regulation aimed at the asset management community to enable greater consistency on the application of what is often subjective analysis.

Geopolitical fractures in the period were accentuated by pockets of autocratic uprising across the globe. The deep fault lines of East vs West intensified. Salisbury was firmly planted on the diplomatic map and US-China trade wars heightened. Closer to home, the United Kingdom exited the European Union, creating a more boisterous narrative of protectionism.

In the midst of this journey, 2020 brought a global pandemic that created one of the most significant humanitarian crisis in modern history. Millions have died, economies have been crippled, borders have been closed and social inequality has been accentuated. The most marginalised bear the heaviest toll, both in terms of fatalities as well as economic effect through job loss and hardship.

Within this social emergency, the chilling murder of George Floyd triggered Black Lives Matter protests across the globe, fuelled by inequality and economic isolation. Recent data suggests that progress on the rate of women’s participation rate in the workforce has reversed by decades. It has never been so clear that a more inclusive economic framework is so urgently needed.

Viruses, like greenhouse gases care little for borders. And in the last three years, stark images of koalas clinging to burning bushes, wild fires in the Arctic circle, severe droughts in sub-tropical Taiwan and a deep freeze in Texas have made world leaders sit up and take notice. They have begun to understand that climate change is fast becoming relevant to both the four year democratic cycle and economic resilience. In 2018 the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released its highly influential Special Report on Climate Change, highlighting the advantages of keeping global temperature increases to just 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels and the need to reach net zero emissions by 2050 to achieve this goal. Recognizing that huge transformations in technology and behaviour are required, governments and companies alike have subsequently been making commitments to achieve net zero by 2050. The change of guard in the U.S. earlier this year saw the Biden-Harris administration leading the world’s largest economy and second largest carbon emitter once again into the fold of Paris climate accord, and working directly with the world’s largest emitter – China – to tackle the climate crisis.

Addressing biodiversity and natural capital loss is also rapidly moving up the political and social agenda. 50% of global GDP is substantially reliant on natural ecosystems, which are being rapidly depleted; to continue our current living standards we need 1.6 earths. Earth overshoot day – the point at which humanity’s use of ecological resources and services exceeds those the planet can replenish – each year has moved back to August 22 in 2020 from September 23 in 2000.

The past three years have been extraordinary. The UN and the World Bank have warned the pandemic has undone decades of work to reduce inequalities, pushing millions around the world into extreme poverty. Concerns about economic performance following lockdowns caused a financial market rout, prompting governments and central banks to release a wave of stimulus. Interest rates are being held at historic lows and many government bonds are trading in negative yield territory. At the time of writing, government debt levels across the world are at or near levels not seen since World War Two, raising the importance of building back a better, fairer economic system as generations face the consequences of repaying this debt in the future.