When parody meets dystopia

On a (possibly) bright winter day in Davos this January, a group of insurers brought together by the UN to fight climate change issued a document setting out emission-cutting target-setting requirements for the industry.

The document, proudly if not very originally named the NZIA Target-Setting Protocol, gave insurers strict deadlines for adopting “science-based, intermediate targets for their respective insurance and reinsurance underwriting portfolios in line with a net-zero transition pathway consistent with a maximum temperature rise of 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels by 2100.”

In early April, Munich Re, a signatory to the NZIA, which stands for Net-Zero Insurance Alliance, left the organisation, citing antitrust risks. The risks referred to stemmed from a Republican backlash against all the target-setting in the United States that also saw Vanguard quit NZIA’s sister organisation, NZAM, where the AM stands for Asset Managers.

Shortly after Munich Re, and by shortly I mean a few days later, Zurich Insurance Group also upped and left, saying it wanted "to focus our resources to support our customers with their transition".

To make sure nobody could accuse it of being flippant on its emission commitments, the insurer also said that "Zurich’s sustainability ambitions pre-date its membership in the NZIA. Withdrawing from the NZIA will not change the Group’s commitment to sustainability."

Then, last week, Hannover Re joined the quitters’s club, saying only that the exit was the outcome of “careful consideration” and, of course, assured everyone interested that "Regardless of this, Hannover Re remains committed to its sustainability strategy, the associated goals and its support for the Paris Agreement, and aims to achieve full climate neutrality by 2050 at the latest."

Heaven forbid someone thought that any of these insurance giants would suddenly stop caring about the transition.

Meanwhile, the NZIA Target-Setting Protocol got enriched with a 1.5-page “Important note”, in which the organisation pledged it will not tell its members exactly what measures to take in order to achieve their emission-cutting targets and how to go about carrying these measures out.

Tellingly, the note also said, “For the avoidance of doubt, NZIA members are under no obligation to continue their relationship with NZIA and, while this document may propose general measures and best practices on how to set and pursue individual targets, NZIA members shall, at all times, each remain free to determine and implement their respective decarbonisation strategies independently and unilaterally.”

Translation: Please don’t leave, we promise we won’t tell you what to do and we absolutely promise to not break any antitrust laws. We’re only here for the good conversation. Forget about those deadlines, let’s be friends again.

And the NZIA exodus is not even the funniest recent development in the world of climate change, anxiety, and target-setting.