Welcome to our special April issue on ‘The Future of Water: Impacting Businesses and Communities’. It has been a surprisingly quick two years since we last devoted an entire issue to the theme of Water. Our featured writers have a variety of important things to say, but it all boils down to – Water is Life.
Kirsten James, program director of Water at Ceres, encapsulates the April issue well, stating “As the global water crisis worsens, so do financial risks facing companies and their investors, driving many to prioritize water risk and act as responsible water stewards in their operations and supply chains. Fresh water is essential to people, ecosystems and business. Growing water scarcity and pollution is threatening these systems and slowing the pathway to a climate resilient future. No industry or community is immune from this crisis.”
In addition to Kirsten, the other featured writers include: Investing in the Future of Water and Sanitation by Elan Emanuel of WaterEquity (an asset manager, cofounded by actor Matt Damon and Gary White of Water.org). Also, How the Future of Water will Impact Businesses and Communities by Doug Pushard of KuelWater and HarvestH2O, as well as The Economic and Water Impacts of the EPA’s “Slaughterhouse” Rule by Marc Yaggi of Waterkeeper Alliance.
You will also find a new article by indigenous economist and founder of First Peoples Worldwide, Rebecca Adamson on Water + Indigenous Peoples Rights = Risk. And, ImpactAssets just released the new edition of their ImpactAssets 50 List, spotlighting a diverse landscape of impact investment fund managers.
Finally, we congratulate Sallie Krawchek and the Ellevest team who recently hit the $2 billion mark of assets under management. Well done. She saw many years ago, that focusing on the financial power of women was under represented in the marketplace.
Staying on that theme, in case you missed our March ‘Women and Impact Investing’ issue, (all written by women) you can still find their excellent articles here on our website.
As the busy spring conference season continues, you can keep up to date on forthcoming events with GreenMoney’s Global Green Events Calendar. Let me recommend two June conferences: GreenFin the Sustainable Finance and Investing event in NYC, and the US SIF Forum on Investing in a Sustainable Future in Chicago (which I will be attending).
– Cliff Feigenbaum, founder & publisher