Climate protection: from resignation to action - Allianz calls for sustainable investments

Michael Diekmann, Chairman of the Board of Management of Allianz SE, calls for a determined effort to protect the world's climate. At an anniversary event on the occasion of the 125-year existence of the Group, Diekmann emphasized: "Reconciling economic development and climate protection is probably the biggest challenge of our time - and in this endeavor the mistakes made during the industrialization in the 19th century must not be repeated." Moreover, Diekmann countered a wide-spread concern: "We believe it to be absolutely wrong for environmental and climate protection to be solely at the expense of prosperity and growth."

 

Numerous representatives from politics, industry, academia and society debated the issue of "Environment and Climate Change: from Resignation to Action" at yesterday's special gathering in the Allianz Auditorium in Munich.

Michael Diekmann, Chairman of the Board of Management of Allianz SE
Michael Diekmann, Chairman of the Board of Management of Allianz SE

"Insurers as the backbone of the economy"

 

Christiana Figueres, Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the UN's top climate official said in her key: "As a backbone of the economy, Allianz and the insurance industry generally needs to move from pricing risk to managing it. Adaptability and flexibility will be the pathways to insuring risk, especially in the developing world which is likely to bear the brunt of the impacts". Furthermore, Figueres added: "On the investment side, a continuous transformation towards low-carbon investments is crucial and pivotal for catalysing a deep, de-carbonisation and de-risking of the global economy - a paradigm shift and a business model vital for insurers and the peoples of this world."

Christiana Figueres, Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)
Christiana Figueres, Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)

Deputy Minister-President and State Minister of Economic Affairs of Bavaria Ilse Aigner (CSU) emphasized in her speech Germany’s global responsibility: “We cannot just sit back and watch climate change happen, but rather, in our capacity as an economic powerhouse, we have to play an active role in environmental protection – also at international level.” She added that the G7 summit in Elmau, Bavaria, presented an excellent opportunity in this respect.

 

Diekmann set the Munich event in context with the first public dialog on demographic change in Berlin at the beginning of February: "Indeed, the two issues of demography and climate change are closely related as far as their fragile nature is concerned, because as a result of the demographic explosion of the past decades we are straining our planet to its limits."

 

Most people find the climate discussion is too abstract

 

Given a world population which, in this century still, will grow up to ten billion, the resource consumption will continue to increase and, based on the current energy mix, will by far exceed the load limit. However, the climate discussion often does not reach people. They find it too abstract in many aspects, and international politics appears to them as divided, thus diminishing the importance of this issue. But for Diekmann one thing is clear: "Continuing like this is no solution."

 

Of key importance to him are the investments necessary to renew and expand infrastructure: "The more investments already flow into sustainable infrastructure today, the better. Because the costs for continuing on the current path are incessantly going up." As an insurer and investor, Allianz is active in the area of climate change both nationally and internationally: for example, through investments in alternative energy generation amounting to 2 billion euros, environmental protection projects to conserve forests in Kenia and Indonesia, as provider of more than 150 green products and services as well as member of the UN Global Compact and through the activities of the Allianz Environment Foundation and Allianz Climate Solutions.

Deputy Minister-President and State Minister of Economic Affairs of Bavaria Ilse Aigner (CSU)
Deputy Minister-President and State Minister of Economic Affairs of Bavaria Ilse Aigner (CSU)

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Petra Krüll
Allianz SE
Phone +49.89.3800-2628

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Nicolai Tewes
Allianz SE
Phone +49.89.3800-4511
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