We must evolve our ways of working and ensure the integration of sustainability throughout our operations, strategy and decision-making to deliver on our sustainability commitments for our healthcare tenants, Unit Holders and broader stakeholders.
A sustainability governance model has been adopted to lead and oversee the effective execution of our sustainability efforts in order to drive accountability throughout Northwest.
We recognise that effective sustainability governance requires executive and Board level oversight, leadership, strong central support, and integration into lines of business to effectively achieve our goals. In 2021, we established a sustainability committee to guide progress towards our ambition.
The committee regularly engages with the Board of Trustees on priority topics including sustainability risks and opportunities, targets, and alignment to our overall organisational strategy and vision. We have established working groups to convene relevant cross-functional stakeholders to coordinate and drive the implementation of our sustainability initiatives, and facilitate sharing of best practices across our global organisation.
We are committed to integrating sustainability across the building lifecycle, including our investment process, enabling us to support our commitments in achieving net-zero and providing high-quality spaces for our healthcare tenant partners.
As part of our current acquisition due diligence process, we already include select sustainability dimensions that align to GRESB guidelines, such as building safety, land contamination, compliance, energy supply, flooding, infrastructure and water supply. We will continue to integrate sustainability into our standard investment process by using S&P Global’s modelling software to measure the physical climate risks of each acquisition target through Measurabl. This process will allow us to mitigate risks that could impact the long-term value of our portfolio.
Northwest have committed to embed a green lease clause within all new leases in recognition of the importance of having the right mechanisms in place to ensure we are able to measure the environmental impact of our buildings and tenants, but also guide tenants towards taking a more sustainable approach to their operations and initial fit-out.
The green lease clause should be in all new leases going forward and all tenants will receive a copy of the landlords fit-out guide.
Vital is committed to annually reporting to GRESB (formerly Global Real Estate Sustainability Benchmark) as an internationally recognised benchmarking process. In 2023 Vital has been recognised as a 2023 Sector Leader by GRESB in both the Standing Investments Benchmark and the Development Benchmark a Global Listed Sector Leader – Healthcare Standing Investments, Global Listed Sector Leader – Healthcare Development and Global Sector Leader – Healthcare Development.
GRESB Sector Leaders are the best performers (first place) by sector and region, with the top scores.
For the third consecutive year, Vital has participated in CDP (formerly the Carbon Disclosure Project) a not-for-profit charity providing a disclosure framework for organisations and cities to review their environmental footprint. Vital scored a B- for 2022 and has been assessed as achieving a Management level for against environmental impact.
A B score indicates environmental management. The management score indicates good environmental management with evidence of identified environmental impacts.
Vital is a Climate Reporting Entity (CRE) and subsequently required to comply with the Financial Sector Amendment Act 2021 to provide a climate-related disclosure. In accordance with the External Reporting Board (XRB) Aotearoa New Zealand Climate Standards (CS1, CS2 and CS3), Vital will release a disclosure prior to October 2024. The XRB Standards follow the recommendations and guidance of the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) with an aim to support the allocation of capital towards activities consistent with a transition to a lower emissions climate-resilient future.
Vital engaged auditors Deloitte to undertake an independent gap analysis of current business activities and operations against the released XRB standards. The gap analysis has enabled management to provide clear direction on informing actions throughout many different business divisions, to be delivered in line with the programme outlined below.
In alignment with the XRB standard’s, our climate scenario analysis will involve climate related risk and opportunity assessments on all standing assets across a variety of time horizons and RCPs. To facilitate the analysis of these climate scenarios, Vital was an active participant in the working group collaborating to deliver the NZGBC Climate Scenarios for the Construction and Property Sector document.
