Is your pension vegan?

[robert99]

Do you know where your pension money goes?
Swedish
Danskt pensionsbolag köper åkermark
English
Denmark's AP Pension to invest in Romanian farmland

Anders Nørgaard, chief executive at FirstFarms, said the agreement gave his company an even better opportunity to finance its strategic goal of further growth.

The deal is expected to be in place within 2-3 months once certain conditions have been met and due diligence completed satisfactorily, FirstFarms said.

Under the deal, FirstFarms will sell its company in eastern Romania with 3,000 hectares of agricultural land, grain storage and farm buildings to AP Pension.

It will keep the machine park, which will continue to be used for operation of the land.

Land and buildings will be rented by FirstFarms for a 10-year period with possibility of extending this, and FirstFarms will also have first right to buy the land back if the agreement comes to an end.

The company said the agreement was similar to deals AP Pension has already made with several Danish farmers.

Following on from the eastern Romanian land deal, FirstFarms and AP Pension said they would jointly identify more land, which could be included in the cooperation.

Dal Thomsen said FirstFarms had shown it could run a profitable operation in Romania, even in a year with difficult cultivation conditions.

He said land prices in the country could still rise from their current levels.

FirstFarms said land in other European countries cost seven to eight times as much, and that this price differential was far from justified by yield differences and climate conditions.

 

[robert99]

In Canada -
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/84a646a0-dedc-11e5-b67f-a61732c1d025.html#axzz48tE6Atzo

The Canada Pension Plan Investment Board is about as Canadian as an institution can be — except on the Saskatchewan prairie, where it has in effect been labelled an outsider.

Saskatchewan this year outlawed all pension plans from buying farmland. It was a move to clip the ambitions of CPPIB, one of the world’s largest pension fund managers, which had already scooped up 115,000 acres (46,500 hectares), and to calm a powerful constituency of farmers in the country’s agricultural heartland.

“We do not need ‘Wall Street’ investors speculateing [sic] on our farmland,” a 70-year-old resident wrote to Saskatchewan’s agriculture minister ahead of the policy change.

The wheat, canola seed and barley fields of Saskatchewan are among the many fertile regions where big money has been scouting for land — and encountering conflict. Financial investors own tracts that grow corn and soyabeans in Illinois and Uruguay, almonds and cattle in Australia, and sugar beets and wheat in Poland. Some are venturing into countries with potentially volatile politics such as Ethiopia and Ukraine. CPPIB’s land purchase in 2014, aimed at enhancing its investment portfolio for 18m retirees, led to a backlash in a province that accounts for 40 per cent of Canada’s farm area.

The asset class is attracting more attention as investors diversify away from stocks and bonds and bet that people will eat richer food on a more crowded planet. As populations and incomes grow in Asia, Africa and other developing regions, rising demand for meat, dairy and nuts is transforming farmland. Investment is “one of the most important and effective” ways to boost production and economic growth, reduce poverty and strengthen food security, says OECD-UN Food and Agriculture Organization in its latest outlook.

The largest private farmland investor, TIAA, has amassed more than 1.6m acres across hundreds of properties in the US, Brazil, Australia and eastern Europe in the past decade. The US-based asset manager, formerly known as TIAA-CREF and which was founded to serve university teachers, just closed a second $3bn farmland fund. A recent presentation touted a $2bn pipeline of more than 100 properties on 1m acres.

The landscape for investors can be rutted with restrictions. Several US states including Iowa, the biggest corn grower, have long prohibited corporate ownership of farms. Investors in many parts of the world may lease, but not own land.

Brent Bechtle, head of agriculture funds at Proterra Investment Partners, a recent spin-off from the agribusiness Cargill, views farmland as “kind of an emotional sector”. Proterra has raised almost $800m since 2010 in three farmland funds already active in Australia, Colombia, Mexico and Paraguay.

 

[Moll Flanders]

To be honest it would be pretty difficult to only invest in ethical companies, or to expect your government to do so. Actually it would probably be impossible to only invest in vegan companies.

 

[Poppy]

DH's 401k is invested in all kinds of things - I'm sure many of which I would hate. I have a much smaller IRA that is Invested with First Affirmative, which is more environmentally oriented than vegan. I have a vegan friend who is a financial adviser with them, and I know she goes to their annual meeting and urges them to look for vegan and animal friendly investments.

 

[robert99]

Uk - Shopping guide to Ethical Pensions, from Ethical Consumer
and What is Ethical Investment
A private pension plan/fund should be possible to be "vegan".

I'm not sure if it's easier to say what is not vegan or what is, in this instance. No meat, fur, leather dairy etc or invest in crops, certain cosmetic companies, vegan toalett paper etc.

Maybe we need Peta to come up with a list

EDIT - from 2010 "Mr Coates rated Aegon Ethical Equity because Ms Ryan “embarrasses most other equity managers by outperforming them – even with a vegan fund”. How can an ethical fund hold BP?
More on Ms Ryan and her ethical problems at Spotlight on Aegon Ethical Equity fund