Climate change

The goal of sustainable development will clearly remain unachievable if climate change continues unabated. For this reason, current climate trends play a central role in sustainable development and have been high on Swiss Re’s agenda for some time. In fact, Swiss Re was one of the first global companies to recognise the challenges posed by a changing climate.

Climate change can best be tackled by considering it both a risk and opportunity.

Although it is never truly stable, the climate in which mankind has been able to progress so rapidly over the last 250 years may be set for significant change. Swiss Re first recognised this trend in the early 1990s. Exploring and explaining the risks associated with climate change has since become the flagship initiative of the Group’s corporate sustainability engagement. The topic exemplifies how both business, and society in general, is vulnerable to an unsustainable environmental trend. However, Swiss Re is convinced that climate change can be tackled and that this is best done by considering it as both a risk and opportunity.

The company’s almost 20 year engagement in the climate debate has developed into a 4 pillar strategy comprising enhancing our understanding of the risk, developing relevant products and services, risk dialogue and tackling our own emissions . A comprehensive overview of Swiss Re’s positions and strategy on the topic can be found on our Climate change web site.