This case study shows how Scotiabank partnered with survivor support organisations to improve financial access for modern slavery survivors. By piloting a simplified, risk-based customer due diligence approach, the bank balanced regulatory compliance with social inclusion, demonstrating a practical model for inclusive banking within existing know-your-customer (KYC) frameworks.

The report argues that climate justice is integral to fiduciary duty, as climate and inequality risks threaten long-term value. It outlines definitions, system-level investment frameworks, and practical tools that help investors manage systemic risks and support a just low-carbon transition.

The report outlines a framework for a Responsible Digital Finance Ecosystem, urging holistic, collaborative consumer protection amid rising digital finance risks. It defines ecosystem actors and four pillars—customer centricity, collaboration, capability, and commitment—to strengthen regulation, improve outcomes, and reduce harms in rapidly evolving digital financial services.

This article highlights the major climate impact of livestock and explains why the absence of clear roadmaps, metrics, and financing strategies has left the sector far behind the energy transition. It proposes policy reforms, mitigation hierarchies, and justice-centered pathways to unlock effective and equitable change.

A practical guide outlining how financial institutions can scale transition finance through governance, eligibility criteria, portfolio segmentation, due-diligence enhancements and engagement. It highlights Canadian market context, barriers, and actionable “top tips” to support credible decarbonisation, stewardship and collaboration across the financial system.

Institute for Sustainable Finance (ISF) at Smith School of Business, Queen’s University, is Canada’s first multi-disciplinary hub aligning finance with environmental sustainability. It conducts research, publishes policy guidance, and runs education and collaboration programmes to help policymakers, investors, and firms integrate climate risk, nature, and ESG considerations into capital allocation and regulation.

The paper models how misaligned sustainable finance taxonomies can cause cross-border capital leakage, reducing alignment with developed-market standards. It identifies four ratios determining whether endorsing common ground improves outcomes and shows leakage can be significant without regulatory measures to differentiate and prioritise higher-quality green bonds.

The report outlines guidelines for financial institutions to integrate gender perspectives across governance, management, staffing, communications, and product design. It promotes data-driven policies, bias reduction, inclusive culture, tailored financial solutions for women, and strategic partnerships to enhance women’s financial inclusion and strengthen institutional performance.

The report reviews how businesses can better respect and support human rights defenders by strengthening policies, due diligence, and accountability. It outlines emerging frameworks, examples of company action, implementation challenges, and recommendations for companies, investors, multistakeholder initiatives, and States to safeguard civic freedoms and address risks linked to business activities.

This report outlines how climate and nature risks threaten the Earth system that underpins economies and societies. It proposes a Planetary Solvency framework, using risk-led assessment principles to inform policymakers of escalating systemic risks, tipping points and mitigation needs, emphasising the urgency of realistic global risk management to avoid severe disruption.

This guide provides a framework for incorporating climate-related risks and opportunities into business valuations. It outlines a five-step process, highlights data and disclosure challenges, and illustrates application through case studies. The aim is to support more consistent, transparent and informed valuation practice as climate impacts become increasingly material.

This month’s sustainable-finance roundup highlights faster transition momentum, rising physical risks and a tightening focus on accountability. COP30 reinforced expectations for stronger 2035 targets, while national actions underscored diverging paths toward decarbonisation. Markets continued shifting toward clean energy and resilience, and new science made climate harms more visible. With regulatory scrutiny and litigation increasing, transition credibility and real-economy resilience are becoming core drivers of financial risk and investment decisions.

This guidance outlines how organisations can assess nature-related dependencies, impacts, risks and opportunities across their value chains. It explains common challenges, approaches using the TNFD LEAP framework, and the role of primary and secondary data. It also summarises how major sustainability frameworks address value chain considerations.

This benchmark series assesses the world’s most influential companies on their human rights, decent work and ethical conduct practices. It provides a comparative view of corporate social performance, supporting stakeholders to understand progress, identify gaps and inform actions that contribute to a more inclusive and sustainable global economy.

The ESG and the Sustainable Economy Handbook series is a multi-part research and guidance series that explains how environmental, social and governance (ESG) considerations intersect with legal, operational and investment practices across global markets, supporting finance professionals and corporate actors to understand and integrate ESG into business and investment decision-making.

The report analyses how legal frameworks across major jurisdictions shape investors’ ability to pursue sustainability impact. It clarifies when impact-focused approaches are permitted or required and outlines policy options to support them. It provides guidance for aligning investment decisions with sustainability goals while maintaining financial objectives.