ignazio visco : the conference messages in light of the g20 presidency programme remarks by mr ignazio visco, governor of the bank of italy, at the green swan 2021 global virtual conference, 4 june 2021. * * * let me start by thanking the conference organisers – the bank for international settlements ( bis ), the banque de france, the international monetary fund ( imf ), and the network for greening the financial system ( ngfs ) – for their kind invitation. i also wish to express my heartfelt congratulations for the organisation of this event : the valuable contributions provided by the participants, along with their commitment and support, are powerful allies in the fight against climate change. this conference confirms that there is now widespread awareness of the importance of the problem : climate change is having an evident effect on all our countries, threatening economic growth, development and financial stability. the changes that are taking place to the environment also threaten our health, as demonstrated by the tragedy of the covid - 19 pandemic with which we are still struggling : many of the root causes of climate change, such as deforestation and loss of habitat, by increasing the chance of contact between people and wildlife, amplify the risk of new future pandemics. contrasting these risks and shifting economic development towards a sustainable path requires strong and consistent political determination and the involvement of all human activities. the first step is to transform our energy systems : we need to implement clean and efficient technologies at unprecedented speed and scale. but no country can tackle this problem alone, as carbon emissions know no border. climate change is a particularly dangerous example of a negative externality : pollution is a cost that spills over not only into other markets besides the one in which it originated, but also into other countries, reducing the effectiveness of national policies. close international coordination is therefore essential. achieving net - zero emissions requires first of all the cooperation of all national governments. we must indeed bear in mind that governments are the key players in this context : they are the only institutions that can levy taxes on carbon emissions, introduce regulations to curb their amount and provide incentives to green investments. yet, finance can also go a long way in helping and reinforcing this process, channelling resources towards sustainable investments. the group of twenty ( g20 ) is the ideal forum in which global cooperation can take place. g20 country members account for 80 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions : achieving the “ decarbonisation

will focus on climate - related financial risks by promoting firm - level disclosures, metrics for the assessment of climate - related vulnerabilities and best practices on regulatory and supervisory tools to identify climate - related risks to financial stability. the fsb is also working with the g20 sfw g to define a roadmap focusing on climate - related financial risks, in order to accelerate the works already underway and to avoid duplications. finally, the g20 presidency promotes the use of digital finance to help market participants in considering sustainability risks. harnessing big data, artificial intelligence, remote sensing and other similar innovative technologies can help to collect and process a very large amount of datasets, increasing transparency and accessibility of information. the recent launch of the g20 techsprint 2021by the bank of italy and the bis innovation hub will also be important to this end, by encouraging entrepreneurs and start - uppers to develop solutions for data collection and verification, climate risks assessment and connecting sustainable projects and investors. we 3 / 7 bis central bankers'speeches have received more than 70 high - level applications, a very important result given the complexity of the topics. data issues let me now dedicate few minutes to one of the key issues in both this conference and the work of the g20, the question of data availability. improving the assessment of climate - related financial risks and facilitating their integration into investment strategies requires closing data gaps by enhancing disclosure by firms. the quality of information on climate - related risks seems to be lower than those of a financial nature, such as market and credit risks. this problem is partly due to the wide range of definitions of sustainability risk used by financial investors. in the case of credit risk, for example, the common definition considered in the market leads to a high correlation of credit scores across rating agencies. in the case of sustainability risk, on the other hand, there are very diverse definitions, spanning from those more concerned with its short - term financial effects to those more attentive to the long - term impact of sustainability. as a consequence, esg scores show a much lower correlation across score - providers. a common definition of sustainability is a necessary ingredient to improving corporate disclosure. disclosure standards, based mostly on voluntary practices, are highly heterogeneous in quantity and quality. according to the “ global outlook for sustainable investment 2021 ” by the oecd, esg data cover about 95 per cent of listed firms in terms of market capitalisation in the