People & Appointments: Aviva poaches Phoenix Group’s head of climate and nature risk

Aviva has hired Phoenix Group’s head of climate and nature risk Leah Ramoutar as its environmental sustainability director. In this role, she will lead Aviva’s Climate Centre of Excellence and Environment Hub. She has been at Phoenix for more than 14 years and was head of TCFD and group sustainability lead before being promoted to head of climate and nature risk in 2022.

The International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) Foundation has appointed Morgan Després as ones of its five new trustees. He has been executive director for international climate finance, land use and net-zero macroeconomy at the European Climate Fund (ECF) for the past year. Després joined the ECF after 18 years working in the French public sector on financial stability and international and European financial regulation issues, most recently as director of strategy at the Banque de France. He was the founding head of the Secretariat of the Central Banks and Supervisors Network for Greening the Financial System (NGFS). The trustees will begin their terms on 1 January 2024.

Carl Moxley has been appointed group climate director at Legal & General, where he will lead the group’s climate strategy. He replaces Simon Gadd, who is moving into an advisory role at Legal & General Group. Moxley joined Legal & General Retirement in 2017, serving most recently as chief financial officer.

Luca Bonaccorsi has joined PwC as an ESG director. He leaves his position as chief sustainability officer of Nomisma, an independent research centre, after seven months in the role. Bonaccorsi is a member of EU standards body EFRAG’s sustainability technical expert group and will continue in this role. He was formerly director of sustainable finance at Transport and Environment, and was a member of the EU Sustainable Finance Platform between October 2020 and 2022.

Livio Stracca, deputy director general financial stability at the European Central Bank has been appointed as the new chair of the Network for Greening the Financial System’s (NGFS) workstream on climate scenarios. He replaces Cornelia Holthausen, who is director general macroprudential policy and financial stability at the European Central Bank.

The United Overseas Bank (UOB) has set up a sustainability advisory panel comprised of industry experts who will support the bank’s board and management on its sustainability strategy, targets and initiatives. UOB has appointed three members to the panel for a one-year term. They include managing director at the Centre for Nature and Climate at the World Economic Forum Neo Gim Huay, cluster president for Singapore, Malaysia and Brunei at Schneider Electric Yoon Kim, and chairman of shipbuilding company Seatrium Mark Gainsborough. The advisory group will work closely alongside the bank’s corporate sustainability office.

Financial regulator the Canadian Securities Administrators (CSA) is inviting new members to join its Mining Technical Advisory and Monitoring Committee (MTAMC). The committee is a “forum of communication between the CSA and the mineral exploration and mining industry” set up to advise the regulator on developments and issues that could impact the Canadian mineral project disclosure regime. It will be composed of around 12 volunteers from different sectors of the mining industry, who will serve a three-year term. The deadline for applications is 3 November.

The Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment is seeking a deputy director to work alongside executive director Nick Robins in its Just Transition Finance Lab. The lab has secured anchor funding for the next three years and is actively hiring for core roles to drive its research programme forward. The successful candidate will be responsible for programme oversight and co-ordination, building and overseeing of the systems and processes that will be critical to the lab’s long-term success. The deadline for applications is 12 November.

Karin Pasha-Huizinga has left Cardano after 12 years to join private credit specialist Colesco as responsible investment officer. She was previously head of ESG services at Cardano.

ESG consultancy ERM is hiring a sustainability reporting director. The successful candidate will oversee the consultancy’s reporting framework and disclosures across various standards including the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive, Global Reporting Initiative, EU Taxonomy, Taskforce on Climate-related Financial Disclosures and Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures.

Brunel Pension Partnership is recruiting an independent chair. The pension pool, which manages £37 billion ($45.1bn; €42.8bn) in assets for 10 Local Government Pension Schemes (LGPS), is looking to develop its strategy for the next phase of development and “continue to build its strong commitment” to responsible investing.

ESG Book has appointed John Wise as its first board chair. He joins from InvestCloud, which he co-founded and led as CEO for the past 13 years.

Christophe Christiaen has started a part-time secondment at UK pension scheme Nest as an ESG research associate. He is head of spatial finance initiative at the Oxford Sustainable Finance Group, where he has worked for the past two years. Christiaen is also head of innovation and impact at the UK Centre for Greening Finance and Investment.

Dutch investor and NA100 member PGGM is seeking to build out its team, with two internships to support its engagement with corporates on biodiversity and nature loss. Netherlands-based master’s students, with the offer of a “competitive internship allowance”, are being encouraged to apply and help the €228 billion fund research, assess and help engage companies on the issue.

The Australian Sustainable Finance Institute (ASFI) is recruiting a policy manager and a taxonomy development technical analyst. The policy manager will lead the implementation of ASFI’s policy and government engagement workstream, which works with the Australian government at the political and departmental level. The successful candidate will also generate support and funding for ASFI’s priority projects. The deadline for applications is 2 November.

The taxonomy development analyst will work alongside the taxonomy project lead and manager to map out Australian regulation, policies and law, benchmark industry best practice, and draft taxonomy technical reports for the Taxonomy Technical Expert Group (TTEG). The deadline for applications is 18 November.

Marek Hudon has been nominated as the next chair of NGO Finance Watch, having served as vice-chair since June 2022. He replaces Alexandra Andhov, who is an associate professor in corporate law at the University of Copenhagen. Hudon is a professor at the Solvay Brussels School of Economics and Management, at the Université Panthéon-Sorbonne and at the Université de Namur. He is also co-director at the Centre for European Research in Microfinance, and a director at the Centre of environmental social and economic studies in Brussels.

Former global head of sustainability at Investec Tanya Dos Santos has joined business consultant Emergent Africa as a sustainability adviser. She has also started at the Gordon Institute of Business Science on the climate leadership and sustainability workstreams.

Irene Monasterolo has joined the Utrecht University School of Economics as a full professor of climate finance. She leaves France’s EDHEC Business School, where she was a climate finance professor for two years. She will continue as a visiting research fellow at Boston University.