Twelve European pension funds and providers have been included in the Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI) leaders’ group for 2020.

The PRI said the list showcased PRI signatories that demonstrate a breadth of responsible investment excellence, and that excel specifically in this year’s theme: climate reporting.

“While the leaders’ group consists of a largely even split between investment managers and asset owners, with 20 investment managers and 16 asset owners identified as leaders in climate reporting, asset owners are better represented relative to the PRI’s total reporting signatory base,” the PRI said. “Some 4 per cent of all asset owners made it to the 2020 leaders’ group, compared to 1 per cent of all investment managers.”

It congratulated the signatories that made it into the group, in particular for their responsible investment work in climate reporting.

In 2019’s group, when the theme was selection, appointment and monitoring of external managers, there were 47 asset owner signatories in the group, including 19 European pension funds and providers.

The European funds and providers included in this year’s leaders’ group include four from the UK, Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS), Environment Agency Pension Fund, Brunel Pension Partnership (BPP) and Church Commissioners for England.

Two funds and/or providers from Finland (Ilmarinen Mutual Pension Insurance Company and Varma Mutual Pension Insurance Company) were included, alongside two from France (Natixis Assurances and Caisse des dépôts et consignations), AkademikerPension from Denmark, Stichting Pensioenfonds ABP from the Netherlands, Allianz SE from Germany and AP2 from Sweden.

AP2, Varma, Caisse des dépôts et consignations, Environment Agency Pension Fund, USS and Stichting Pensioenfonds ABP were also in the leaders’ group in 2019.

Commenting, AkademikerPension CEO, Jens Munch Holst, said: “We sit and work with green and climate-friendly investments every day. So being selected as one of the leading companies in the world to do that is fantastic.

“Even though coal, oil and tar sands have been sold off, the company is far from finished.

"With countries still building coal-fired power plants and a rainforest on fire, there is still a need for lots of green and climate-friendly initiatives."

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