Living within Safe and Just Earth System Boundaries, Organized by ING Bank at the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam

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Introduction: 120 people presents. This week, Professor Joyeeta Gupta gave a keynote talk at an event hosted by ING for directors of charities and endowment funds in the Netherlands. To kick off an afternoon focused on sustainability, Professor Gupta delivered a fiery argument for the critical need to take action to bring our societies within safe and just planetary boundaries. She discussed the critical state of the environment and climate, the potential pathways and actions needed to bring global emissions down to true zero, and the role of financial institutions, including banks and philanthropy, in doing so. Critical to bringing emissions down both net zero and true zero is ending new investment into fossil fuel and rapidly phasing out fossil fuel extraction. The afternoon’s talks were followed by a panel discussion which dove further into the steps and actions needed from different actors and levels of society, from municipalities and individual foundations up to the banking and broader financial sector, as well as national and international policy. Many of the ways that foundations and philanthropy could contribute to the transition were discussed, including the myriad possibilities for foundations to aid in phasing out fossil fuels, from funding training for transitioning workers to assisting with decommissioning fossil fuel assets. Drastic changes will be needed from all of us, including philanthropies. The panel also discussed the need to rethink the purpose of charitable trusts; rather than maintaining assets into perpetuity, they should critically assess their societal impact and actively work towards a sustainable future. We hope that foundations found this discussion provoking and fruitful for future discussion on how to evolve their own institutions in a rapidly transitioning world. The fossil fuel sector has made it clear that it will not be leading the transition; a good start for institutions dedicated to sustainability is to ensure that their finances, associations, and engagements are directed elsewhere.

Role: Keynote speaker and panelist.