|
March 08, 2000
UK Fund Family Gets Ecological
Spurred by an impending disclosure law, Pavilion Asset Management leads the ranks by offering a
socially responsible pension fund option.
SocialFunds.com --
Social investors in the UK can look forward to a fruitful summer of new products, thanks to a
pioneering law requiring British pension funds to disclose their policy on the social and
environmental impact of their investments. One of the first to join the rush to provide socially
responsible pension fund options is a new fund from Pavilion Asset Management, the Eco Friendly
Fund.
 Pavilion, a Brighton-based fund manager
and investment subsidiary of Family Assurance Friendly Society, Ltd., with £2 billion in
management, announced this week the launching of their new fund. The Eco Friendly Fund is a
socially and environmentally screened pension fund, one of the first of its kind, that aims to
cater to the growing interest in socially responsible investment in the UK.
"Pavilion
believes that socially responsible investment is set to grow rapidly over the next few months
leading up to July 3 when the requirement to state SRI policy comes into force," said Christopher
Edge Chief Executive of Pavilion. "The combination of our experience in managing the Family
Charities Ethical Trust and our excellent performance record in UK equities means that Pavilion is
ideally placed to manage this fund."
The new regulation, passed by Parliament last July,
requires pension fund trustees to disclose their policies on socially responsible investment, and
on the exercise of shareholder rights, as of July 3, 2000. Social investors welcome this
governmental recognition of the importance of social, environmental, and ethical considerations in
the financial industry.
"This is the first UK legislation specifically on socially
responsible investment," said Penny Shepherd, Executive Director of the UK Social Investment Forum,
a professional organization promoting responsible investing. "It is a coming of age for socially
responsible investment in the UK and a historic moment."
"Over time, it should lead to a
major increase in ethical investment by occupational pension funds," added Shepherd. Socially
responsible investments in the UK currently total more than £2 billion in assets.
Pavilion's Eco Friendly Fund invests in UK equities according to environmental and socially
responsible principles, using a preference strategy that combines positive and negative criteria.
Using a best-of-class strategy, Pavilion managers select stocks whose economic activities are more
environmentally and socially sustainable than others in their class.
Pavilion is one of
the first UK investment houses to use the on-line screening service of Ethical Investment Research
Service (EIRIS), a London-based research organization helping investors apply ethical criteria to
investment decisions. With over 15 years experience and a database of more than 1,200 UK companies,
this service allows Pavilion's fund managers to pick stocks from the FTSE All Share Index based on
the environmental and social impact of their activities.
"By working with EIRIS to monitor
all stocks in the FTSE All Share Index, Pavilion is able to take a preference approach to the
ethical screening of the Eco Friendly fund," said Edge. "This approach, which uses an average score
to find the best in sector, means that the fund does not have to exclude any sectors thus avoiding
the volatility traditionally associated with ethical investment."
With Pavilion's
management and EIRIS's research, the Eco Friendly Fund is a strong addition to the field of
socially responsible investment options in the UK. More importantly, it's a harbinger of pension
funds to come.
©
SRI World Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Top
| 
