Speaking to InvestorDaily on Wednesday, Stewart Investors Sustainable Funds Group head David Gait said asset managers are too focused on developed markets when looking at global opportunities.
“If you want to change the world and if you want to tackle global issues like climate change, there’s 8 billion people living on the planet. Most of them live in developing countries,” Mr Gait said.
“There’s a real role for richer countries to set an example and to lead. If we really want to make change happen, it’s very important for developing countries.”
Mr Gait said that developing countries do not have access to the same resources as richer countries and therefore cannot follow the same steps in regard to sustainability and larger issues such as climate change.
“If you speak to people in India or China, they’ve known for a very long time there’s no way they can follow the development path that we’ve followed in Australia or the UK. The challenge there is how do you lift hundreds of millions of people out of poverty while not following the same development path that we have here?” he said.
“It’s a huge challenge.
“In our view, it’s possible for managers to play a role in that.”
Interestingly, Stewart Investors Sustainable Funds Group does not include net zero in its assessment process as it believes it to be “over-simplistic”. Mr Gait said that though the issue is hugely important, it should be viewed in a broader sense.
“We’ve always viewed climate change as part of a broader goal or vision,” he said.
“In our view, while net zero carbon or net zero poverty do help to illuminate some of the challenges, the ultimate challenge is how to find a way of allowing 6, 7 billion people on one planet to achieve high human development within the environmental constraints that we all face.”
