The giant Dfl100bn (e45.4bn) PGGM Dutch pension fund for health, mental welfare and social workers has awarded a Dfl50m SRI mandate to ASN, part of ASN bank in the Netherlands, with a view to eventually benchmarking all its assets against a set of socially responsible as well as investment-driven criteria.
Alfred Kool, spokesman at PGGM, says: “This mandate for ethical investment is a pilot. We are now working out all the details of the mandate, such as a defined investment criteria and benchmark, and hope to start investing by February/March next year. We will evaluate the success of the investment, because although we want to do much more SRI investment we have to build up experience in the area. The aim is that we would like to carry out all our investments on a socially responsible basis, but the question is how far can we go?”
He adds that the process will take time, and notes that the first aim of the fund is to maximise revenues. “But within that context we are trying to do our utmost on the ethical side.”