River and Mercantile (R&M) has lost another senior figure with the departure of its group head of ESG after just 18 months.
Roger Lewis (pictured) has taken up the newly created role of head of ESG at Downing, reporting to chief operating officer James Weaver.
His departure follows co-founder Dan Harbury exiting R&M to rejoin his previous employer in the wake of its acquisition by Martin Gilbert’s Assetco earlier this year.
Lewis only joined R&M in February 2021 after a year as ESG associate director, real assets at Carbon Intelligence, which helps firms calculate, verify and improve supply chain emissions.
Before that he spent six years at Aviva Investors, having worked at Legal and General Investment Management prior to that.
See also: Assetco aims to get River and Mercantile profitable by early 2023
A ‘game changer’ in asset management
Weaver commented: “We are delighted to welcome Roger to the Downing team – I am sure that we will benefit greatly from his wealth of experience in ESG strategy, governance, integration to investment and engagement activities, and reporting across quoted and unquoted markets.
“Having worked and communicated with investors across a range of asset classes as well as a deep understanding of ESG issues, Roger will play a key part in developing exciting ESG opportunities for our investors.
“As a business we are committed to placing ESG factors at the heart of everything we do and he will play a key role driving that agenda across our funds, investment trusts and tax-efficient products within our principal business areas of renewable energy, infrastructure, property, and healthcare.”
Lewis added: “Having witnessed ESG go from chief investment officers describing it as ‘something we are not doing’ in 2017, to being a game changer in asset management led by climate change, the number of ESG stakeholder expectations, roles, funds, tools, reports and associations continues to rapidly expand.
“Capitalising on this opportunity, while avoiding the risk, requires many approaches. This is a critical time for ESG, transitioning from nascent to well established to various possible scenarios of future outcomes.”
