Jakarta, CNBC Indonesia – The world is currently still gripped by worries and preoccupied with handling the Covid-19 pandemic. However, many ignore that there is a “pandemic” that is infecting the earth and has a deadly effect on humans like Covid-19, namely climate change.
It was Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati who stated that there was another threat currently threatening citizens around the world, the impact of which was as big as the Covid-19 pandemic.
“Climate change is global disaster which magnitudeIt is estimated that it will be the same as the Covid-19 pandemic,” he said at the ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) Capital Market Summit, on Tuesday (27/7/2021).
The event was held by the Financial Services Authority (OJK) to commemorate the re-activation of the capital market, together with self regulatory organization (SRO) such as PT Indonesia Stock Exchange (IDX), PT Clearing Guarantee Corporation of Indonesia (KPEI), and PT Kustodian Sentra Efek Indonesia (KSEI).
ESG is an investment principle that does not only pursue profit but strives to create sustainable value from environmental, social and good governance aspects. This issue was first raised in a United Nations (UN) report entitled “Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI)” released in 2006.
According to the BNP Paribas report entitled “ESG Global Survey 2019”, the majority of managers stated that they would increase their fund allocation to ESG principled investments. This is an increase compared to survey findings in previous years, which shows that investors are increasingly concerned about environmental issues.
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Photo: Source: BNP Paribas (2019)- – |
In the environmentally aware investment forum, Sri Mulyani said that the similarity between a pandemic disaster and a climate change disaster lies in its broad impact and can hit all countries, and trigger massive deaths if not handled properly.
But the two are different in terms of mitigation. Covid-19 appears without warning, no one can predict the pattern and flow of its spread. Meanwhile, climate change is a threat that has been predicted and warned by scientists in various countries.
“Even like a pandemic, countries that are least prepared in terms of their health systems, in terms of their fiscal capacity, in terms of their discipline and in terms of their ability to get vaccines and get vaccinated will probably be the hardest hit,” he said.
Unfortunately, this aspect of mitigation has not yet been manifested in our changing habits. If the citizens of the world are now used to social distancing and health protocols, climate change has not yet led to changes in the habits of consumption patterns of energy and other resources.
On the one hand, people are not familiar with carbon emission diets, or initiatives to reduce polluting activities, on the other hand the majority of countries around the world have not made drastic policy changes to make industrial and business activities more environmentally friendly.
For Indonesia, the urge to implement policies to prevent global warming is no longer negotiable, especially since research shows that the Republic is in fact positioned as the most vulnerable country to the effects of climate change.
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