Doccuments

12th Conference – London, England

March 20, 2018

Date: 20 March 2018
Location: London, England
Host Institution: European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD)

Objectives

The main objective of the conference was to gather representatives of Development Finance Institutions (“DFI”) that are signatories to the Corporate Governance Development Framework, to acknowledge the importance of corporate governance in investment operations and to engage with investee companies for the promotion of better governance practices.  Of the 35 signatory institutions, representatives from 26 DFIs attended the conference, along with over 60 external guests.  Responses to the annual questionnaire on implementation progress reached almost 90% this year and showed that over 80 initiatives, including CG tools, action plans, client training, and institutional collaboration have been adopted by signatories to this day.

The 12th Annual Corporate Governance Conference underlined the importance of Corporate Governance in creating value and promoting solid corporate governance practices among DFI clients.  Highlights included a keynote speech by Dutch MBA Professor Eric Vermeulen on how technology and data have allowed companies to become flatter and “platform- based” in order to survive. The “name and shame” and “name and shine” principles of the UK Stewardship Code were presented as well as the strategies used by large and medium sized funds like Blackrock and Aberdeen to instigate better governance practices in their clients. On cyber security, an expert panel raised the issue of risks mostly emerging from negligent or malicious employees and urged the audience to consider implanting threat intelligence systems into daily operations and selecting nominee directors who are cyber savvy.

Main Outcomes

  • Follow up on signatories’ implementation of the Framework by providing advice, sharing lessons learnt, and providing training, when possible;
  • Promote regional cooperation initiatives among signatories (e.g. EDFI and Latin American networks);
  • Promote technical analysis and collaboration (e.g. Corporate Governance in Project Finance and Infrastructure projects);
  • Explore opening the initiative to non-DFI investment communities;
  • Plan and organise the 2019 annual CG DFI Conference (Washington, DC).

Participants