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COLUMBIA ... CCSI Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment Newsletter: July 2022 Original article: https://mailchi.mp/law/columbia-center-on-sustainable-investment-july-2022-newsletter?e=2de55a71d5 Peter Burgess COMMENTARY Peter Burgess | ||
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Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment Newsletter: July 2022
July 2022 Newsletter Lisa Sachs ccsi@law.columbia.edu via gmail.mcsv.net July 28th 2022, 11:23 AM Dear Colleagues, The Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment (CCSI) is pleased to update you on select events, recent publications, and projects at the Center. Please check our website for more information about these and other activities.
CCSI Welcomes Chris Albin-Lackey, Grace Brennan, and Madeleine Songy! We are thrilled to welcome three new staff members to our team! Chris Albin-Lackey joins CCSI as inaugural Director of Programs, to advance the Center's mission and strategic goals. Grace Brennan and Madeleine Songy join as Program Associates, supporting the Center’s research and programmatic work on land, agriculture & food systems, and on investment policy, respectively. Read their full bios here. Accepting Applications Through August 15 for 2022 Executive Training on Investment Treaties and Arbitration for Government Officials October 3-7, 2022 We are accepting applications through August 15 for our annual Executive Training on Investment Treaties and Arbitration for Government Officials, which will be held virtually, 9am-11:30am ET, from October 3-7, 2022. This course is designed for government officials facing complex and pressing issues relating to international investment treaties, including the consideration of unilateral and multilateral reform options. The course will address: States’ objectives in their investment policy; links between treaties, investment flows, and development objectives; investor-state dispute settlement, and the concerns of states; trends and developments in treaty practice; opportunities and challenges facing governments in treaty reform; and other approaches to investment governance, including dispute prevention and alternatives to ISDS. For more information, and to apply, visit our website. Impact Assessments of Investment Treaties Trade and investment agreements can have critical impacts on environmental, social, economic, and human rights issues and policies. Impact assessments can predict, assess, review, and evaluate the impacts of these treaties. To date, however, impact assessments have been used infrequently and are narrow in scope. CCSI has posted a presentation that shares some history and pathways for more effective impact assessments. Allocation of Climate-Related Risks in Investor–State Mining Contracts In a new paper, CCSI’s Martin Dietrich Brauch and Perrine Toledano, along with research assistant Cody Aceveda, examine risk allocation provisions that are commonly used or could be used in mining contracts and discuss how those provisions should be drafted to allocate the risks and impacts associated with the ever-worsening effects of climate change between states and mining companies. The paper covers the following clauses: force majeure; liability and compensation or indemnification for climate-related risks; insurance requirements; stabilization or change-in-law clauses; periodic review; warranties and representations; step-in rights; termination; and investor–state arbitration clauses. Martin and Perrine have also published a blog summarizing recommendations for climate-related clauses in oil, gas, and mining contracts. Visit our page to read these and other CCSI publications on climate-related contractual clauses. MOOC on Natural Resources for Sustainable Development Selected for Faculty for a Future Global Top Thirty List CCSI is excited to announce that our MOOC on Natural Resources for Sustainable Development was selected for the Faculty for a Future ‘global top thirty’ list of courses recommended for integration in universities around the world. Academics are now invited to join international disciplinary panels to help drive change in curriculum design globally. New EMGP Report: The Top 20 Czech Multinationals in 2020 As part of the Emerging Market Global Players (EMGP) Project, a long-term study of the rapid global expansion of multinational enterprises (MNEs) from emerging markets, convened by CCSI, The Faculty of International Relations at Prague University of Economics and Business is releasing the results of a survey on outward investors in Czechia in 2020. EMGP Joining the Emerging Markets Institute at Cornell University We're delighted to announce the integration of CCSI's Emerging Market Global Players (EMGP) Project into the Emerging Markets Institute (EMI) at Cornell University. CCSI's EMGP project was founded over a decade ago by Karl Sauvant to highlight and study the extraordinary importance - and dynamic evolution - of emerging market multinationals. We have been delighted to partner with EMI over the years, as EMI has grown into a remarkable hub of research, publications, and convenings. We are so pleased to transition our EMGP project under EMI’s umbrella, where our partners will benefit from greater institutional opportunities, integration and connections. We look forward to continued collaboration with our partners, old and new, through EMI's programs! CCSI In the News ‘Disaster Land Grabs’ Worldwide and in British Columbia CCSI’s Sam Szoke-Burke is featured in a long-form piece in The Tyee on “disaster land grabs”. Building on CCSI’s earlier op-ed on consultations during Covid-19 and CCSI and IIED’s flagship ALIGN report on Covid-19 and land-based investment, the article zeros in on a controversial gas pipeline project crossing Indigenous Wet’suwet’en territory in British Columbia, Canada that was advanced during the early stages of the Covid-19 pandemic. Read the article here. Renewable Energy Sector’s Community-Level Human Rights Risks CCSI’s Sam Szoke-Burke is featured in a podcast by the Innovation Forum where he discusses the impacts of commercial wind and solar project deployment on the human rights of Indigenous Peoples and local communities. He explains why governments, companies, and investors cannot ignore the importance of respecting human rights, not only for the sake of impacted local communities but also in order to avoid operational, financial, and reputational risks which can delegitimize the sector and limit its ability to expand responsibly and contribute to meeting our global climate goals. Sam highlights the key steps renewable energy companies should take to ensure they respect communities’ human rights, which are laid out in CCSI’s recently-published Business Guide and Legal Primer. Driving Change Through Sustainable Investment CCSI's Perrine Toledano was interviewed by The Assay, for their Clean Energy edition. The article discusses sustainable investment and how through research, training, and advisory projects, Perrine works on the impact of the energy transition on extractive industry investments. The article also discusses how mining could play a role in the energy transition beyond providing the much needed minerals. Electric Cars and the Climate Crisis CCSI's Perrine Toledano was quoted in an article by Insider, discussing the difficulty of identifying mineral-demand forecasts in the green transition. Past Events July 13: Carbon Emissions Reduction in Mining: Approaches and Best-Practices Perrine Toledano was a speaker for an online event on “Carbon Emissions Reduction in Mining: Approaches and Best-practices,” organized by GIZ Sector Programme Extractives and Development, the Sino-German Center for Sustainable Development (CSD) and the China Chamber of Commerce of Metals, Minerals & Chemicals Importers & Exporters (CCCMC). Perrine’s presentation drew on findings from CCSI’s work on the Renewable Power of the Mine and the decarbonization of copper and nickel value chains. June 22: Presentation for the World Bank on Decarbonizing Paraguay’s Energy Sector Perrine Toledano and Martin Dietrich Brauch were invited by the World Bank to virtually present CCSI’s Decarbonization Pathways for Paraguay’s Energy Sector report at an internal World Bank workshop regarding their work on a new Country Climate and Development Report (CCDR) in Paraguay. June 8: Accelerating Investments for Sustainable Development In a webinar hosted by the Columbia Global Center in Beijing, CCSI’s Martin Dietrich Brauch spoke about the challenges and opportunities of sustainable investment in the context of the zero-carbon energy transition, including the needs to move away from investment protection and arbitration and toward investment governance, phase out fossil energy investment, and strengthen climate-related disclosures. View the video of the event. From Our Fellows New Book on 'Earthly Order' by CCSI Senior Fellow Saleem Ali ... CCSI Senior Fellow Saleem H. Ali has published a book on environmental systems for a broad audience. Earthly Order: How Natural Laws Define Human Life has received endorsements from Nobel laureate Roald Hoffmann, the former Environment Minister of Brazil Izabella Texiera, and the Chief Environment Officer of Microsoft Lucas Joppa, and was recently profiled by the Guardian. He shared his motivation for writing it in a short video for Oxford University Press. He is donating all royalties for environmental education programs in developing countries. Use this link to read the reviews and order a copy of the book directly from Oxford University press. The book is also available for e-readers via Amazon Kindle. Karl Sauvant ... An Inventory of Concrete Measures to Facilitate the Flow of Sustainable FDI: What? Why? How? ... In the third edition to this article, CCSI Senior Fellow Karl Sauvant, et al, examines an informal and unofficial compilation of investment facilitation measures. It is intended to support the WTO negotiations of an Investment Facilitation for Development (IFD) Agreement, as well as unilateral, bilateral and regional efforts to facilitate sustainable foreign direct investment flows. A number of the investment facilitation measures that were mentioned in earlier editions of the Inventory are now reflected in the current IFD Agreement draft text. The updated version contains additional actionable investment facilitation measures emerging from stakeholder consultations. In addition, various country examples and new sections that specifically identify concrete home country measures and climate FDI measures have been added. This new edition also contains specific proposals for further measures that could be considered in the WTO negotiations. Copyright © 2022 Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment (CCSI), All rights reserved. Our mailing address is: Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment (CCSI) Columbia Law School - Earth Institute, Columbia University 435 West 116th Street New York, NY 10027 ccsi@law.columbia.edu
| The text being discussed is available at | https://mailchi.mp/law/columbia-center-on-sustainable-investment-july-2022-newsletter?e=2de55a71d5 and |