The SEC issued the first ever climate-related disclosure rule earlier this week. In the 3-2 vote, commissioners adopted the rule requiring companies to disclose certain-climate related risks. This rule, which has been long awaited by investors, will require companies to disclose material climate-related risks, activities the company is taking to mitigate these risks, the Board oversight to the climate risk and mitigation, climate targets material to the business, as well as scope 1 and scope 2 emissions deemed material by the company, and reasonable attestation.
While this rule has been weakened from the proposed 2022 rule, Seventh Generation Interfaith, Inc. welcomes the final climate disclosure rule and the SEC’s consideration of our comments. SGI formally submitted one of thousands of comment letters with the proposal of the rule in 2022. In fact, the SGI comment letter was cited seven times by the SEC in the final rulemaking. This rulemaking brings the US closer in alignment to its global peers. SGI is committed to playing an active role in creating a more just and sustainable world. Investors have and will continue to seek clear, consistent, and comparable information on how companies are managing their climate- related risks and opportunities.
We are disappointed that Scope 3 emission disclosure was omitted from the final rule as the omission will convey an incomplete picture of companies’ risk exposure. This omission means companies will not have to disclose a category of emissions that account for as much as 80-90% of total emissions in some industries. We hope that companies will provide this information to investors voluntarily. We also believe that companies that choose not to disclose Scope 3 emissions will fall and have already fallen behind peers as it will be required in European reporting requirements under CSRD as well as California’s new disclosure laws. The new rule is a starting point, and higher achieving companies with more robust disclosure will produce greater long term value for shareholders.
The United Nations Climate Summit (COP28), which took place in Dubai, recently ended with a monumental report that still falls short of necessary progress. World leaders, climate experts, at least 1,300 fossil fuel lobbyists, and one CEO of a large fossil fuel company attended the meetings. ExxonMobil CEO, Robert Woods, attended COP28, marking the first time the CEO of a large fossil fuel company attended the meetings. And sure, while Woods said the conversations “put way too much emphasis on getting rid of fossil fuels, oil and gas” and not enough on “dealing with the emissions associated with them,” he at least was still part of the discussions.
The long-awaited and contested COP report recognizes the need for a transition “away from fossil fuels in energy systems, in a just, orderly and equitable manner, accelerating action in this critical decade, so as to achieve net zero by 2050 in keeping with the science.”
For the first time fossil fuels were explicitly discussed and named as a cause to the climate crisis. While the report’s vague language requires more work to ensure its potential, Mindy Lubber, CEO of Ceres, sums it up nicely:
The agreement comes at an urgent moment. Extreme weather and other climate-related catastrophes are already causing hundreds of billions of dollars in damage each year. The world is at severe risk of far greater challenges as we are on track to miss the 2030 goals of the Paris Agreement and achieve a zero emissions economy in time to prevent catastrophic climate change. At the same time, governments, businesses, and investors have a monumental opportunity to invest in secure, affordable, and reliable clean energy technology that brings enormous economic benefits and job growth.
In addition to the climate talks at COP, other commitments concerning Methane Emissions recently showed some progress.
Methane, a highly potent climate pollutant, that is responsible for approximately one-third of current warming resulting from human activities. While ExxonMobil, the world’s second largest oil refiner, reported making great progress on its methane emissions reduction, the company was only doing so with estimated emissions, not direct measurements. Without measured data, studies have shown that companies may misallocate capital to less impactful and less cost-effective mitigation opportunities.
Immediately before COP 28 ExxonMobil, announced that it was joining OGMP 2.0, the Oil & Gas Methane Partnership. This came as shocking and exciting news after last proxy season. The Sisters of St. Francis of Dubuque, along with co-filers Benedictine Sisters of Mount St. Scholastica, Congregation des Soeurs des Saints Noms de Jesus et de Marie, and Dana Investment Advisors filed a resolution at ExxonMobil asking the company to issue a report analyzing the reliability of its methane emission disclosures. While ExxonMobil’s opposition to the resolution highlighted their participation in OGCI, Global Methane Partnership, and legal hurdles, the resolution garnered an impressive 36% vote.
This announcement of Exxon joining OGMP 2.0 is a huge step forward because under OGMP reporting, better-quality emissions data allows operators to accurately understand and characterize methane emissions from their assets, informing a more effective mitigation strategy.
In addition to ExxonMobil and others joining OGMP in the past few weeks, the EPA released its new methane standards which should help reduce methane emissions. EDF reported on the new rules and how they will help OGMP members comply. There’s been other methane regulation advancements in the EU, China, Australia, and Canada as well.
The COP agreement, Methane regulation, and hopefully new SEC climate disclosure rules in 2024, there is a lot of forward momentum in the climate world. What is needed now is continued corporate action and more climate policy nationally and internationally.
SGI members are continuing engagement on climate crisis issues such as GHG emissions, methane, the Just Transition, science based targets and climate transition action plans, as well as climate lobbying.
There’s still much more work to be done. Next year’s COP is planned to be held in Azerbaijan, one of the birthplaces of the oil industry.
On September 12th, Seventh Generation Interfaith Coalition for Responsible Investment (SGI) will celebrate fifty years of service for people and planet. Founded in 1973 by pioneers in corporate shareholder engagement, Fr. Michael Crosby, O.F.M., Cap., Sr. Alphonsa Puls, S.S.S.F., and Sr. Charlita Foxhoven, S.S.S.F., SGI members have engaged multinational corporations to promote more sustainable and just practices for five decades.
The 50th Anniversary Celebration will take place at SGI’s annual conference on Tuesday, September 12th, from 4:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. at St. Francis Parish, located at 1937 N. Vel R. Phillips Avenue, Milwaukee, WI 53212. There will also be an option to attend virtually.
While recognizing the landmark achievements of the organization under Fr. Crosby and its co-founders, the conference will also focus forward, on how Milwaukee-based SGI is working to shape better outcomes at corporations in the 2020s and beyond.
In addition, Dan Tretow, the member representative for the School Sisters of St. Francis (S.S.S.F.), will receive the 2023 Fr. Mike Crosby Award.
From SGI’s inception, Fr. Mike aided faith groups to ensure their investments reflect their beliefs and values, rather than inadvertently funding activities that conflict with those values. While smaller faith groups face particular obstacles given the complexity and challenges of investing, SGI has proven to be low cost and efficient as members implement faith-consistent investing with limited resources. SGI was the first coalition to join ICCR to enhance its shareholder advocacy for systemic change.
SGI’s 50-year track record promoting environmental and social corporate responsibility and facilitating values-aligned investing spans many of the most urgent environmental and social issues facing people today, including climate change, economic inequality, racial justice, workplace diversity, political spending and lobbying disclosure, and executive compensation.
The Board of Seventh Generation Interfaith Coalition for Responsible Investment is pleased to announce that Dan Tretow, the member representative for the School Sisters of St. Francis (S.S.S.F.), has been selected to receive the 2023 Fr. Mike Crosby Award. The award will be presented in a reception at the SGI conference on September 12th. The Fr. Mike Crosby Award recognizes a person who has promoted a more just and sustainable world and exemplifies the passion and commitment of our founder, Michael Crosby, O.F.M., Cap.
“We are delighted to honor Dan Tretow,” said SGI Board Chair Cindy Bohlen. “Dan was instrumental in helping SGI become a member-led organization. As SGI’s second board president, Dan’s leadership enabled SGI to build capacity and empower its members toward fulfilling its mission to build a more just and sustainable world for those most vulnerable by integrating social and environmental values into corporate and investor actions.”
“Dan took time out from his day job to be on our first Board of Directors and served as our Treasurer in 2015,” said Frank Sherman, previous executive director. “He stepped up again in 2018 to become our President at a critical time in SGI’s development. I came to rely on Dan for his experience and patience; but it is his deep faith and warm friendship that I appreciate the most. Brother Mike will be pleased to see that Dan won this award presented in his name. Congratulations, my friend!”
“It has been a pleasure and gift to work with Dan over my years with SGI. He is often among the first to recognize and lift up the good work done by others to support SGI, and he quietly supports the organization in a myriad of ways,” said SGI executive director Chris Cox. “Now, we get to return the favor as we recognize his deep contributions to SGI. We are grateful for Dan’s generosity and the 50-year legacy of the School Sisters of St. Francis with SGI.”
Dan has been the member representative for the School Sisters of St. Francis and worked with the Wisconsin Coalition and its successor organizations, now SGI, since the early 80’s. His longest standing work in CRI involves the members working with a Wisconsin corporation on human rights, executive pay and supply chain sustainability. Dan was a founding SGI board member and held the offices of Treasurer and President. Amid questions about the future of SGI following Fr. Mike’s untimely death, Dan was instrumental in repositioning our coalition to the member-led organization that it is today. Dan works for the School Sisters of St. Francis – Generalate as Director of Financial Services and St. Joseph Center Facility Director.
SGI was founded in 1973 by Fr. Michael Crosby, O.F.M., Cap., Sr. Alphonsa Puls, S.S.S.F., and Sr. Charlita Foxhoven, S.S.S.F., who were pioneers in corporate shareholder engagement.
Tomorrow, August 16th, marks the one year anniversary since the passing of the Inflation Reduction Act 2022 (IRA). The legislation provides authorization for Medicare to negotiate directly with drug manufacturers to bring down the price of ten high-cost prescription drugs for the benefit of seniors covered by Medicare.
Prescription drugs have assumed an increasingly important role in American health care, a trend likely to continue. One study estimates that “[p]rescription drug spending on retail and non-retail drugs is poised to grow 63% from 2020 to 2030, reaching $917 billion dollars” (p. 2).
In the 2023 proxy season, a national coalition of long term, faith and values-based investors, who are members of the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility (ICCR), filed resolutions with five major pharmaceutical companies, with a brand new ask: a report on the process that pharmaceutical companies use to determine whether to apply for a secondary or tertiary patent, intended to qualitatively verify if promoting access for patients, was a relevant factor in this process.
This resolution received 31.1% of investors’ support at the Merck AGM held on May 23rd 2023. The resolution secured 30% of the vote at Pfizer; 16.5% of the vote at Gilead, 14.42% at Johnson & Johnson. Just a few weeks later, on June 6th, 2023, Merck & Co. Inc. filed a lawsuit against the Department of Health & Human services (HHS) and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), alleging “extortion” and a violation of their 1st and 4th amendment rights, in respect to the proposed negotiations of drug prices, on behalf of seniors covered under Medicare, as legislated under the Inflation Reduction Act 2022. Bristol Myers Squibb (BMY) followed with a similar lawsuit. Both companies are represented by the law firm, Jones Day. Lawsuits have been filed by Astellas and Johnson & Johnson in other jurisdictions. As well, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the trade association Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA) have filed suits with similar claims.
“Patients continue to suffer as prescription drug manufacturers jack up prices and rake in billions in profits,” the letter said. “We have yet to see the USPTO take substantial steps to exercise its existing administrative authorities to help lower drug prices, encourage competition, and increase innovation.”
A Thicket of Lawsuits
The lawsuits that Merck and the others have opted to file serve to fuel the controversy and fail to address the underlying concerns for equitable business decisions that serve the public who need access to these life saving drugs. Pharmaceutical companies have had a long run of putting their profit above all else, and this unregulated behavior has not served the patient, the taxpayer, seniors or any member of the public who is uninsured, underinsured and/or has an insurance company disallow a claim to secure access to the prohibitively expensive drugs, even though these drugs may save an individual’s life. While innovation was intended to save lives, the profit motive instead has rendered access to life saving drugs a luxury for those who are rich enough to afford them.
Here are the hard truths:
Pharmaceutical companies have benefitted from federal research and development tax credits, on the grounds that they require investment for innovation to develop life saving drugs. Over time and due to the adherence to free market economic theories, buttressed by failures to regulate the business conduct of these pharmaceutical companies, they have business standards and processes that serve their profit motive without due consideration of how patients can secure their access to gain the innovative benefits of these patented drugs.
These same pharmaceutical companies have engaged in lobbying to keep their profits healthy and growing, while they continue to pocket the federal tax credits and “covet” the research of the National Institute of Health (NIH), all paid for by the very same taxpayers they now litigate and have been lobbying against over decades.
The allegation that negotiating drug prices for ten drugs yet to be named, for the benefit of seniors covered under Medicare, is “extortion”, exposes the singular profit motive of the leaders and management teams of these pharmaceutical companies.
Lawsuits are expensive and contentious and they run afoul of the values statement of every pharmaceutical company in respect to their mission of serving the needs of patients, with their innovative medicines and vaccines.
The claims in the lawsuits are explosive and tactically crafted in response to the politics of the day and accusations of profiteering and gaming the patent system levied by both the Republicans and Democrats in oversight committee hearings.
The legal claim seeking an injunction is frivolous, premature and may be an abuse of the legal system, since no loss or damage has been sustained by Merck or BMY, nor is there any continuing loss and/or damage being sustained by these companies or any other party to the litigation, which is the only basis for a claim for an injunction.
The claim that the IRA requirement to negotiate drug prices is a violation of Merck’s and BMY’s 1st and 4th amendment rights, adds insult to injury, since these lucrative and highly profitable pharmaceutical corporations have unfettered rights to unilaterally fix drug prices and to extend their patent exclusive periods, unfairly preserving their monopoly.
Given the news coverage exposing the reality of patent thickets and how the pharmaceutical companies are gaming the patent system, the lawsuit filed by Merck and BMY is tone deaf to public sentiment and dismissive of public wellbeing, and, as investors, we urge pharmaceutical companies to refrain from filing lawsuits that do not address the public right to healthcare, that do not address the underlying concerns over the unaffordable prices of life saving drugs and that do not align with their own Mission and Values statements to serve the benefit, interest, wellbeing and life of the patient.
We are grateful to Andrew Behar, CEO of As You Sow, who has shared this excerpt from his 2016 book, The Shareholder Action Guide, for our series remembering Fr. Mike Crosby and fifty years of SGI.
It goes without saying that a chorus requires more than one voice, so allying yourself with an existing community of like-minded people has obvious advantages. For years, churches and faith-based organizations have been very active in issues of social justice, and those issues have often touched upon corporate behavior. It was through his religious order that Reverend Michael Crosby took on the tobacco industry starting in the 1970s.
Reverend Crosby probably doesn’t fit the expected profile of a shareholder advocate. He’s a Catholic priest at the Province of St. Joseph of the Capuchin Order. In the late 1970s, Crosby was visiting Nicaragua, where his order had a mission, and he couldn’t help but notice how the countryside was plastered with billboards extolling the glories of the revolution and its leader, Daniel Ortega. “I had kind of a distinct reaction,” Crosby said. “How can people be so influenced by such propaganda?”
Soon after his visit to Nicaragua, Crosby was at another mission in Costa Rica. The road to the airport there was lined with billboards, too, but these were quite different. “One billboard after another advertised this and that, and a huge number were cigarettes,” said Crosby, a recovering three-pack-a-day smoker.
The billboards in both countries touted different things, but the campaigns were similar. “All of a sudden it hit me that both were propaganda. In the United States and throughout the world in the market economy, it’s ‘buy, buy, buy.’ What is the difference between one revolution and the other?”
Crosby decided to start something of a revolution of his own. When he returned to the United States, he asked his treasurer to buy ten shares of R.J. Reynolds Tobacco and ten shares of Philip Morris. The small ownership stake was enough to give the order standing to attend the corporations’ next annual general meetings and to file shareholder resolutions if necessary.
When he studied the demographics of smoking, it became clear to Crosby that the majority of smokers begin the habit when they were in their teenage years—just as he had. Father Crosby refined his focus and efforts on addressing the impact that cigarette advertising had on young people.
The Marlboro Man, the peppy models for Virginia Slims with their slogan “You’ve come a long way, baby,” and the defiant Tareyton smokers who would rather fight than switch, were arguably created by Madison Avenue “Mad Men” in the 1960s to appeal to adults.
But what about Joe Camel, the lovable cartoon dromedary who touted R.J. Reynolds’s Camel brand in magazine and billboard ads? Created in 1974 and first used in French ad campaigns, Joe Camel appeared in the United States starting in 1988. Although he lacked a hump, Joe Camel had attitude to spare, and he had lots of leisure time, too. He rode a motorcycle, played pool, and hung out in a hot tub with bikini-clad babes. In short, he did everything an adolescent boy longed to do. Oh, and a Camel cigarette always dangled from his lip.
Talk about swagger. Did he have a face that could pretty easily be confused with parts of the male anatomy? Would advertisers stoop so low? It’s a matter of debate. Google “Joe Camel images” (as we could not get the rights to publish a picture of Joe in this book), and you decide.
Of course, only a cynic would suggest that Joe Camel’s mission was to recruit younger smokers to take the place of the ones dying by the thousands of lung cancer and emphysema.
Crosby focused particularly on R.J. Reynolds, and unfortunately for them, the barrage of publicity, lawsuits, and the shareholder resolution brought by Crosby’s group and by others brought a lot of attention to the matter of youth smoking, including a 1991 study in the Journal of the American Medical Association that showed that as many six-year-olds knew that Joe Camel was linked to tobacco as knew that Mickey Mouse was tied to Disney.
R.J. Reynolds doesn’t inspire the same affection as Disney, and Crosby had it out for Joe Camel, just as he would for a drug dealer hanging around the candy store.
“We generated a tremendous amount of publicity about Joe Camel and its appeal to youth,” said Crosby. “Ultimately, we were one of the voices that got Reynolds to stop. Then we found out they were doing it abroad, and so we filed shareholder actions internationally, and they stopped. That was a big campaign with a significant result.”
Crosby’s campaign against the detrimental health effects of tobacco continues to the present day and has included shareholder resolutions, negotiations, public demonstrations, legal action, political lobbying, and more. Crosby’s order has gone on to file numerous resolutions on the issue of green tobacco sickness, human rights, and the exploitation of workers. It turns out there’s a strong association between youth viewing characters in movies who smoke and their own initiation of smoking. So Crosby and ICCR, along with As You Sow, initiated a shareholder engagement to get Hollywood studios to give an “R” rating to all movies with smoking imagery—a practice that would save 1,000,000 lives, according to a 2012 Surgeon General report and backed up with CDC data.i
By Cathy Rowan, Director of Socially Responsible Investments for Trinity Health
In celebrating SGI’s 50th Anniversary, I am grateful for the years of working with and learning from one of your founders, Rev. Mike Crosby.
In the mid-1990s, when I began participating in the ICCR conferences, I did not know Mike well, but knew him as the person who was always busy typing during the meetings. He produced extensive summaries of all the conference sessions, for the benefit of all the regional coalitions for responsible investment. No one had asked him to do that; it was one of his many ways of faithfully serving others.
Tobacco is a priority issue for Trinity Health, for whom I started working in 2003, and Mike helped and welcomed me in engaging tobacco companies, working to change their marketing practices – with a vision of ultimately transforming those companies to stop selling cigarettes – and in engaging the parent companies of movie studios, to eliminate the depiction of tobacco in youth-rated films.
Mike’s own past experience as a smoker, his sensitivity to the overwhelming marketing of cigarettes to recruit new smokers, plus his faith that does justice were what drew him to take on the issue of tobacco and corporate responsibility.
His work was often questioned by those involved in the tobacco control movement: “Why would you engage with tobacco companies?” His reply: “Why wouldn’t you?”
Mike’s thinking was that if one person’s life could be saved, if one young person decided not to start smoking because the dangers of secondhand smoke were attended to, and incessant marketing to young people was stopped (e.g. Joe Camel or via the portrayal of smoking in movies), he had to engage the companies as a shareholder.
What impact has his work had? Well, for one, we no longer see Joe Camel ads. His efforts to stop the advertising, marketing and selling of cigarettes using the terms ‘light’ or ‘ultra-light’ contributed to the Food and Drug Administration’s 2010 rule banning the use of ‘light’, ‘mild’ and ‘low’ on cigarette packaging. All the parent companies of major studios have policies to limit the depiction of tobacco in youth-rated films, with Disney banning tobacco depictions in all its movies.
Mike’s shareholder advocacy was grounded in human rights. His concerns around tobacco extended to the working, living and health conditions of tobacco farmworkers. He heard about green tobacco sickness – which can occur when farmworkers absorb nicotine through the skin as they come into contact with the leaves of the tobacco plant, causing nausea, vomiting, headaches, dizziness – from Sisters in Kentucky for whom he was giving a retreat. He took the issue to the Altria CEO, who said he never heard of this occupational poisoning.
His initiative led to all the major tobacco companies adopting polices that take into account the health and the working conditions of farmworkers. The resolutions Mike crafted around human rights led to the creation of a multi-stakeholder effort, the Farm Labor Practices Group — companies, labor, government and investors – working to promote worker and human rights in agriculture.
Mike witnessed to Life before an industry whose products produce so much sickness and death. We will never know how many lives have been saved – thanks to his decades of shareholder advocacy.
He is still mentoring me, and cheering us all on as we continue his work.
This reflection is part of a series to observe SGI’s 50th anniversary. On September 12, 2023 Seventh Generation Interfaith Coalition for Responsible Investment (SGI-CRI) will hold its annual conference. This year’s theme is Celebrating 50 Years: The Evolution of Responsible Investing. Learn more here.
SGI began in 1973 when our founders, Fr. Michael Crosby, O.F.M, Cap., Sr. Alphonsa Puls S.S.S.F., and Sr. Charlita Foxhoven, S.S.S.F developed principles to align the stewardship of their financial assets with Catholic Social Teaching. Now, 50 years later, SGI has grown to more than 30 member organizations and members currently engage over 60 companies, leading and participating in over 100 different engagements on issues ranging from climate change, corporate governance, food sustainability, water stewardship, health equity, and human rights.
We are excited to celebrate the work done by those before us and aim to steward the work now entrusted to us. With this, we have revamped the SGI logo to better reflect our name, the circularity of nature, and the evolution of being a catalyst for change.
In 2015, our coalition’s name changed to Seventh Generation Interfaith Coalition for Responsible Investment. The name, Seventh Generation, is derived from the Great Law of the Iroquois to reflect the Native Americans’ love of Mother Earth and all creation. The Iroquois leaders considered the impact of their decisions on the current generation as well as for seven generations into the future. The Constitution of the Iroquois Nation contains the Great Binding Law:
In all of your deliberations in the Confederate Council, in your efforts at law making, in all your official acts, self-interest shall be cast into oblivion. Cast not over your shoulder behind you the warnings of the nephews and nieces should they chide you for any error or wrong you may do, but return to the way of the Great Law which is just and right. Look and listen for the welfare of the whole people and have always in view not only the present but also the coming generations, even those whose faces are yet beneath the surface of the ground – the unborn of the future Nation.
Given the proud history and presence of Native Americans in our Midwestern region and their love of Mother Earth and all creation, we felt this name spoke to our Mission.
Historically Catholic, Interfaith was added to welcome institutions of all faith traditions and secular values-driven investors to be more inclusive and collaborative. By intentionally reaching out and creating opportunities for partnership, we strengthen our Mission to collectively build just and right relationships in our community.
As SGI is celebrating its 50th anniversary, we celebrate the origin of our name which is at the heart of our Mission. Given our primarily Catholic membership, we acknowledge the deep rooted injustices which the Catholic Church and many Catholic orders have inflicted upon Indigenous peoples. We acknowledge, in Milwaukee, that we are on traditional Potawatomi, Ho-Chunk, and Menomonie homeland, and the people of Wisconsin’s sovereign Anishinaabe, Ho-Chunk, Menominee, Oneida, and Mohican nations remain present. There is much more work to do to repair relationships and give back what was unjustly taken. We recommit ourselves to our work and Mission:
Through the lens of faith and the promotion of human rights, Seventh Generation Interfaith Coalition for Responsible Investment builds a more just and sustainable world for those most vulnerable by integrating social and environmental values into corporate and investor actions.
Please join us in celebrating, now, throughout the year, and especially on September 12th, 2023 at our annual conference.
The conference, themed Justice Sown in Peace, recognized the 60th anniversary of the seminal Catholic social tradition encyclical, Pacem in Terris. Among the notable keynoters were Sr. Helen Prejean, CSJ and Marie Dennis of Pax Christi International.
I presented a paper entitled “Investing in Swords or Plowshares?” The paper explores how Catholic institutions may apply faith-consistent investing, drawing inspiration and guidance from CST, to attend to issues of conflict and peace in their investment portfolios. While the conference is immersed in CST, for the actual presentation of the paper, I was delighted to be joined by Mark Regier of Everence Financial, ministry of the Mennonite Church USA. Mark has also served as governing board chairman for ICCR. Additionally, two ICCR members were in attendance.
Focusing on the “preferential option for the poor,” Ann Roberts of Dana Asset Advisors and I presented at the 2019 conference., and in 2025, SGI hopes to return to the conference as it attends to the 10th anniversary of Laudato Si’.
The slides used in the oral delivery of the presentation are available here.
SGI is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year. Founded in 1973 by Michael Crosby, O.F.M., Cap., Alphonsa Puls and Charlita Foxhoven, S.S.S.F., who were pioneers in corporate shareholder engagement. SGI was the first coalition to join the Interfaith Center for Corporate Responsibility (ICCR) to enhance our shareholder advocacy for systemic change.
Our name was changed to Seventh Generation Interfaith in 2015 in reference to the Great Law of the Iroquois to reflect the Native Americans’ love of mother earth and all creation. The Iroquois leaders considered the impact of their decisions on the current generation as well as for seven generations into the future. And in 2017, SGI became an independent 501(c)3. Now, SGI sits at 35 institutional members including 30 Catholic religious orders, a Catholic diocese, and a Catholic healthcare system, as well as three socially responsible asset management companies.
As we enter this new year, we reflect on the initiatives started by Father Mike and other pioneers:
Midwest Capuchins filed the first resolution with Home Products, followed by Bristol Myers and Nestle, to launch a campaign highlighting the connection between increased formula use and rising infant mortality rates in developing countries (1974).
Midwest Capuchins filed the first resolution supporting indigenous rights with Shell (1975).
Midwest Capuchins filed the first political spending disclosure resolution with ITT (1976).
Midwest Capuchins filed the first resolution on high U.S. drug prices at SmithKline (1976).
Midwest Capuchins filed a resolution with Bankers Trust for its lending to a Latin American military dictatorship (1978).
Midwest Capuchins launched a campaign concerning tobacco with Philip Morris (1981).
Midwest Capuchins filed the first resolution concerning global warming with Exxon (1986).
Grand Rapids Dominicans file first resolution calling for package reduction & recycling with General Mills (1994).
Midwest Capuchins file first resolution raising concerns about human rights violations in China at Boeing (1997).
Our impact continues to grow as more investors support our members’ work to catalyze corporate change. In 2022, SGI member filed or co-filed 59 resolutions where, three won majority votes at annual meetings: a racial justice audit at Johnson & Johnson, a civil rights audit at Altria, and a lobbying alignment report at Gilead, and the percentage of proposals withdrawn due to productive agreements with companies was 30%. Collectively, SGI members are a part of over 130 engagements at over 70 companies on issues ranging from Greenhouse gas reduction targets to lobbying and political spending, to racial justice, and affordability and access to medicines.
With Frank Sherman’s retirement, we celebrate and thank all he has done for the growth of our organization. Frank zealously underscored that SGI is a member-led coalition, and staff now will continue to do the same. Frank worked to involve each member organization, emphasizing the impact that they are making on behalf of people and the planet. He built a culture of active membership. In this, Frank recognized that this work needs to be a whole-of-society effort.
As staff, we are energized in the new year and hope to continue to grow SGI and to advance the mission of our members. We see this year ahead of us full of challenges from those who question the relevance or even the validity of ESG, but we continue to fight for shareholder rights and engage companies on pressing issues. Our coalition is growing stronger, and our message is spreading.
There is the fundamental joy of doing this together. We often ask, “Even if you were big enough to do this alone, who would want to?” We believe that our members have been enriched making this journey together. This year is a celebration of the past 50 years of hard work and a reminder of all of the work left to be done.
Seventh Generation Interfaith Coalition for Responsible Investing 