Also in Melbourne in March and attended by BlueChip: the third annual Environmental Social Governance Research Australia (ESG RA) Awards.
ESG RA aims to promote better investment decision-making by encouraging those with the ability to influence investors such as brokers and analysts, to broaden their research remit to include environmental, social and governance factors. In so doing, ESG RA encourages a ‘mainstreaming’ approach, in which ESG-inclusive research is automatically factored into investment decision-making. It’s an approach that recognises that ESG issues have the potential to materially affect financial performance or reputation. Despite this, they are often not included in investment analysis.
The “Best Piece of ESG Research by an Individual Analyst or Team” Award went to Aimee Kaye from Macquarie Securities for her paper “Evaluating Employee Engagement.” The “Best ESG Broking Firm for 2011”, as voted by investment managers, was awarded to Elaine Prior of Citi Investment Research.