By Bob Moritz, PwC Global Chairman
According to the World Economic Forum, the biggest global threat over the next few years is extreme weather. Yet despite the risks, only 40% of CEOs in PwC’s 24th global CEO survey say that they have factored climate change into their approach to managing risks.
This has to change. To limit warming to 1.5°C, the world needs to decarbonise 11 times faster than the global average achieved over the past two decades. Business has to help deliver this rapid acceleration of emissions reduction, and couple it with a commitment to helping manage the impacts of changing climate that cannot be avoided.
Building resilience has to be a team sport. It takes business, government and the public working hand-in-hand to mobilise capital, support public policy and deliver change directly. That’s why we are proud to sponsor the Resilience Hub. We want to help convene the private and public sectors to develop a better understanding of climate change risks and drive action.
This builds on our work with clients around the world to help them transform and build trust with their stakeholders by developing and implementing their climate and wider ESG strategies. For example, we’re using our Climate Excellence approach to identify, quantify and manage climate risk across a portfolio of assets. We’re helping clients apply the methodology in the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures framework (TCFD) to analyse their climate risks and opportunities, as well as model their risks and plan to mitigate them. In the deals space, we’re applying an ESG and climate lens to our due diligence work. And we’re working with governments and non-governmental agencies to help communities adapt to the impacts of climate change and become more resilient.
We’re committed to collaborating with others to help drive systems change. As part of this commitment, we’re working with the World Economic Forum on an initiative to articulate the business case for climate change adaptation and build a coalition of companies and organisations committed to tackling this issue together, which will be featured at COP27.
Businesses everywhere are dependent on elements outside their own operations, so their success depends on the health of the communities and ecosystems they are part of. Working with government, public sector organisations and communities to help build the resilience of organisations, infrastructure and the entire ecosystem is crucial. This is also true for us at PwC. We’ve taken a close look at our climate change risks, by applying detailed climate data to assess physical risks to our member firm offices, and disclosing it as part of our compliance with the recommendations of the TCFD.
If you’re interested in finding out more, please get in touch. And if you plan to visit the Resilience Hub at COP27, we’ll look forward to seeing you there.
PwC is a headline sponsor for the Resilience Hub at COP27.