RI People & Appointments, March 16: OTPP finance chief joins board of renewables firm

David McGraw, Chief Financial Officer of the C$141bn (€104.5bn) Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan (OTPP), has joined the board of Calgary-based BluEarth Renewables. BluEarth CEO Kent Brown said: “David McGraw’s depth and breadth of experience will be a tremendous asset to BluEarth as we continue to target C$1bn of spinning assets by 2017.” Founded in 2011, BluEarth owns or operates renewable energy assets across Canada with a combined capacity of 132.8MW.

Karin Malmberg, former Implementation Support Manager at the PRI, has joined Sustainalytics as Associate Responsible Investment Adviser.

Annalisa Barrett has joined ValueEdge Advisors as a Senior Advisor. ValueEdge was co-founded by Bob Monks and Richard Bennett to advise shareowners on how to use their rights to preserve portfolio value and diminish risk. Barrett is a Clinical Professor of Finance at the University of San Diego, School of Business Administration.

Dennis Van der Putten has joined Netherlands asset manager Actiam as head of ESG. He joins from pensions insurer Zwitserleven where he was investment support manager.

Quilter Cheviot has appointed Gemma Woodward as a senior executive director co-ordinating their approach to responsible investment. Woodward previously held roles at Henderson, Newton, and Kleinwort Benson.

Caroline Escott, former head of government relations at UKSIF, the UK Sustainable Investment and Finance Association, has joined the Association of Professional Finance Advisers as a senior policy adviser. Escott left UKSIF in July last year and had a short stint at Hume Brophy, the public relations company as a Senior Account Manager.

Yvo de Boer, the former executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and current Director General of the Global Green Growth Institute and Jeffrey Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University, are involved in a new project called the Nexus Solutions for Sustainability. It is an initiative of the Global Environmental Facility (GEF), the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA), and the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) and aims to identify integrated approaches to energy, water, food, and ecosystem security in selected regions of the world.

Paul Murray John, former head of emerging market debt at Threadneedle Investments, has reportedly joined Robeco. Citywire reported that Murray John, who left Threadneedle in 2008, joined the Dutch outfit last month as a portfolio manager, running the Robeco Emerging Debt fund. He takes over from Maurice Meijers, who has moved to the firm’s Hong Kong office.Linus Hägg has been appointed Chief Financial Officer of Arise AB, the Swedish onshore wind power firm. Formerly Head of Corporate Finance, he replaces Thomas Johansson, who is leaving the company. Announcement

Maurice Hochschild, who leads Investec’s Power & Infrastructure business, has been named as a non-executive director at Anesco, the UK-based energy efficiency solutions company. The firm says it is on track to almost double in size this financial year, forecasting revenue of over £160m. The company dominant shareholder is CBPE Capital, following a deal last year when it bought Scottish Equity Partners and Hermes’ stakes.

Nandini Sukumar has been confirmed as CEO of the World Federation of Exchanges (WFE), the global trade association of regulated exchanges. She had been Acting CEO since November last year. She joined as Chief Administrative Officer last year, joining from WFE after a 14-year career at Bloomberg News.

Julia Stasch has been named President of the $6.3bn (€5.9bn) John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. Stasch, interim president for the past eight months, was formerly Vice President for MacArthur’s US Programs for 13 years. She is a former chief of staff for Mayor Richard Daley. The foundation said Stasch and her staff have designed a soon-to-be-launched innovative effort to deliver useful capital for the social sector through the creation of market-making investment products and tools and have begun to focus on fewer programs to “free up future resources and enable deeper impact”. Future plans include climate change and nuclear security.

Eliza Manningham-Buller, the former Director-General of the UK’s MI5 security service, has been named chair of the Wellcome Trust, the £18bn (€25bn) charitable foundation. Currently a governor of the trust, she takes over from outgoing chair Sir William Castell, the former BP director.

Mads-Ole Astrupgaard, CEO at the industrial group Fritz Schur Technical Group, has been named chairman of the Danish Wind Industry Association. He takes over from Henning Kruse of Siemens Wind Power.

Stepan Mikolasek has been named as the new Head of Equity at Erste Asset Management (EAM), the Austrian asset manager that is a signatory to the Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI). EAM said that in his new role, Mikolasek would be in charge of the firm’s newly created equity management team, which comprises 20 specialists who manage €4bn in assets. Mikolasek reports to Gerold Permoser, EAM’s CIO. Prior to joining EAM, he was Chief Investment Officer at ISCS, a unit of EAM based in Prague. EAM also said that along with Mikolasek’s appointment, Peter Szopo had been promoted to Chief Equity Strategist.