Global Consortium of Institutional Investors Integrate ESG Factors Into Real Estate

kristySRI/ESG News

Global Consortium of Institutional Investors Integrate ESG Factors Into Real Estate
Investments

GRESB to join forces with GRI to enhance disclosure on sustainability in real estate sector
Amsterdam, April 4, 2012 – Thirty of the world’s largest pension asset managers, the major real estate
industry associations and a large group of stakeholders have put their weight behind the Global Real
Estate Sustainability Benchmark (GRESB), which this week released its third annual sustainability
survey. GRESB also announced a partnership with the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), to enhance
disclosure on Sustainability Reporting.

GRESB has become an important tool in creating more transparency in the environmental and social performance of real estate investment managers. In 2011, more than 350 real estate fund managers and property companies responded to the GRESB Survey. The annual benchmark produced by the consortium is now actively used by more than 30 institutional investors to engage with their investments. Nils Kok, co-founder of GRESB: “It is our belief that benchmarking can help generate and strengthen market forces needed for more efficient use of energy and other resources by the real estate sector, lowering operational costs.” Sander Paul van Tongeren, APG Asset Management, a founding member of GRESB: “For investors, benchmarking sustainability performance provides the opportunity to take into account directly the risks of higher (and more volatile) energy prices, stricter legislation targeted directly at the real estate sector and changing preferences of (corporate) tenants.”

Click here to read “GRESB 2012 Survey