Premiere of GDV Sustainability Day - Prize goes to "Climate Before Eight" initiative
The insurance association is hosting TransVer Day for the first time. This stands for transformation and insurance. There will be two further premieres: the Association's first climate balance sheet and a sustainability award sponsored by the Association.
Insurers are getting greener. Now they have presented their first climate balance sheet.
Following the adoption of its sustainability positioning at the beginning of the year, the German Insurance Association (GDV) has become the first insurance association in the EU to take stock of the situation with its sustainability report, which has now been published. In this light, GDV Chief Executive Jörg Asmussen announced that insurance companies would be recognizably greener as early as 2025. "We're on track for that".
"Around 80 per cent of the investments held directly or indirectly are already invested according to ESG criteria. We will have initial figures for the carbon footprint of capital investments from 2022", Asmussen said in Berlin on Wednesday.
The insurance sector will now work even harder to pull the appropriate levers to quickly achieve climate neutrality, he said. The focus, he said, is on insurers' contribution to mitigating global warming and adapting to the consequences of climate change.
90 per cent of insurers want to organise their business processes in a CO2-neutral way by 2025
In addition, insurers have already achieved or envisaged achieving other important sustainability target markers:
- When insuring risks, more than one-third of the German market (measured by premium income) pays attention to ESG aspects. The share may rise to more than 60 per cent by 2025 if insurers put existing plans into action.
- More than 90 per cent of German insurers want to organise their own business processes in a CO2-neutral way by 2025. 87 per cent of the electricity demand is already covered by green electricity. GDV itself will achieve this goal before 2025, according to Asmussen.
"Climate Before Eight" initiative receives GDV Sustainability Award
As part of "TransVer Day" (the abbreviation stands for Transformation and Insurance) which will be held for the first time on Wednesday, the GDV Sustainability Award will also be presented for the first time. The award winner is the "Climate Before Eight" initiative, which aims to increase knowledge and awareness of climate change among the population. The initiative wants to ensure that scientifically based climate reporting does not eke out a niche existence on the major TV stations, but is broadcast at prime time.
"Sustainability needs publicity. And publicity needs commitment. With their commitment, the members of 'Climate Before Eight' are working to make knowledge and awareness of the need for an ecological transformation of the economy and society accessible to a broader public", said GDV President Wolfgang Weiler, who will present the 5,000 EUR prize together with Claudia Donzelmann, Global Head of Regulatory and Public Affairs at Allianz SE.
"Climate Before Eight" has announced that it will use the prize money to fund a population survey on the perception of climate issues in the media.
As part of "TransVer Day”, numerous guests from politics, business and society want to discuss the challenges of the transition to a more sustainable and climate-neutral economy on Wednesday in Berlin. The GDV Sustainability Day is to be held once a year in the future.