Finland’s public sector pension provider, Keva, has stepped up its engagement with companies in an effort to increase environmental reporting, confirming plans to take part in the CDP’s Non-Disclosure Campaign for a fourth year.

The campaign offers investors the opportunity to engage with companies that have not responded to the CDP disclosure requests, and aims to get companies to report their environmental impacts to CDP.

This, in turn, is expected to promote companies’ own understanding of the risks and opportunities facing their business, whilst also ensuring greater understanding of the companies by investors.

It has grown in popularity, with 168 investors with assets of USD 17trn involved in this year's campaign, 50 per cent more investors than were involved in 2020.

Around 1,321 companies are also involved in the campaign this year, representing a 25 per cent increase on 2020.

As part of the campaign, Keva has targeted companies whose business is considered most tied to the climate, deforestation, or use of water resources.

Its selection criteria has also been expanded to include an examination of any violations involving water or land use or biodiversity.

The group has been involved in 270 requests for disclosure addressed to 238 companies. Of these, 125 companies were in relation to climate, 17 were in relation to forest resources, and 128 concerned water resources.

Commenting on the plans, Keva head of responsible investment, Kirsi Keskitalo, said: "Engagement at Keva has already for years been targeted not just at the climate but also the sustainable use of forest and water resources.

"These days, public debate tends to focus on climate even though all three are interconnected and relate to sustainable use of the natural capital.

“From the risk management perspective, the key thing is to integrate ESG information into the investment process and decisions.

“This is why as accurate and reliable information as possible is needed if it to be usable in the investment process. This is where CDP plays a vital role, since the service providers used by investors also use CDP’s databases in their own analyses.

“According to CDP, companies are more than twice as likely to report their environmental information when investors actively request it. This indicates how effective engagement is.”

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