By Steve Waygood and Stephanie Maier, AVIVA Investors and Felix Dodds, Associate Fellow at the Tellus Institute.

Business and finance in particular, has a critical role in ensuring that the Goals are met. The SDGs have great aspirations for the roughly $150 billion worth of official development assistance (ODA). However, there is insufficient focus on encouraging investors to redeploy the $300 trillion of capital in the global markets in a way that will help achieve these Goals.

Investors can be a catalyst for the innovation in sustainable technologies and entrepreneurialism required to meet the growing demand for goods and services from an ever—growing global population.

Following on this call, this paper outlines the focus in the UN system on, in particular, Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) reporting by companies, the Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI) and the UNEP Inquiry recommendations.