SAN FRANCISCO - Laura Campos, director of corporate and political accountability at the Nathan Cummings Foundation, has been awarded the prestigious Joan Bavaria Award for Building Sustainability into the Capital Markets. The announcement was made today at the Ceres Conference 2019 at the Westin St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco.
The award is given annually by the sustainability nonprofit organization Ceres and the Boston-based investment firm Trillium Asset Management to honor inspiring global leaders working to move capital markets toward a system that balances economic prosperity with social and environmental issues.
This year, the award is recognizing Campos’ enduring legacy in engaging with public corporations on the most critical opportunities to advance sustainability and equality.
“Laura’s efforts to engage investors and companies have achieved impressive results when it comes to improving corporate sustainability performance on a range of environmental, governance and social issues,” said Mindy Lubber, Ceres President and CEO. “It is this type of dedicated leadership that we need more of if we are to transform our economy and build a truly sustainable future for people and the planet.”
“Through almost 20 years of groundbreaking work bringing together grantmaking, shareholder advocacy, and long-term investor perspectives under one roof, Laura exemplifies Joan Bavaria’s vision of a more sustainable economy,” said Matthew Patsky, CEO of Trillium Asset Management. “As an early proponent of foundation leadership in active corporate ownership, she paved the way for this critically important group within the ESG investing community.”
Campos was selected for her relentless advocacy in implementing environmental, social, and governance issues into capital markets through shareholder engagement. Since 2003, she has filed more than 200 shareholder resolutions on topics including carbon asset and climate risk, disclosure of political contributions and lobbying, board diversity, executive compensation, network neutrality, sustainable palm oil sourcing and prison and diversion program labor. She is a natural community builder, working with multiple nonprofit and advocacy organizations including Open MIC, Center for Political Accountability, Color Of Change, and the Action Center for Race and the Economic (ACRE) - acting as a bridge builder between investors and the needs of any social movement.
“How we invest our assets and leverage our influence as investors are powerful tools to drive sustainable and inclusive growth that will create long-term value for people, the planet, and the economy. Laura’s leadership and courageous drive to challenge the status quo has had a significant impact in this space,” said Sharon Alpert, CEO of the Nathan Cummings Foundation. “She deeply understands that who sits on corporate boards, how corporations conduct business and how each measure success are essential to progress on racial, economic, and environmental justice. Laura is a trailblazer, showing the way so more foundations can use their endowments and investments in strategic and holistic ways that create the society we want to live in.”
“I am incredibly honored to have been named the recipient of the 2019 Joan Bavaria Award,” said Campos. “At a time when there’s growing recognition that capitalism as currently practiced is no longer working and that fundamental changes must be made to our market system, Joan Bavaria’s work shows us the way forward. As Ceres, the Global Reporting Initiative and so many other efforts Joan touched have long recognized, capital markets must balance economic prosperity with concern for society and the environment. Doing so is fundamental to capitalisms’ continued survival and to ours.”
The Joan Bavaria award was established in 2008 in memory of Joan Bavaria, a pioneer of social investing who founded Ceres and Trillium Asset Management. Past winners include: Heike Reichelt, head of investor relations and new products at The World Bank; Christiana Figueres, former executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC); Geeta Aiyer, Founder and President of Boston Common Asset Management; Sister Patricia Daly, OP, executive director of the Tri-State Coalition for Responsible Investment; Tessa Tennant, President and co-founder of The Ice Organisation; and William Foote, founder and CEO of Root Capital.
About Trillium Asset Management
Founded in 1982, Trillium Asset Management is an investment management firm with over $2 billion in assets under management. Trillium integrates Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) factors into the investment process as a way to seek to identify companies better positioned to deliver strong, long-term performance. Trillium has a long history of managing equity and fixed income portfolios for individuals, foundations, endowments, religious organizations, and other non-profits. For more information, visit www.trilliuminvest.com.
About Ceres
Ceres is a sustainability nonprofit organization working with the most influential investors and companies to build leadership and drive solutions throughout the economy. Through powerful networks and advocacy, Ceres tackles the world’s biggest sustainability challenges, including climate change, water scarcity and pollution, and equitable workplaces. For more information, visit www.ceres.org and follow @CeresNews.