John Scott

Head of Sustainability Risk at Zurich Insurance Group

Speaker

John Scott is Head of Sustainability Risk for the Zurich Insurance Group. He joined Zurich in 2001 becoming Head of Risk Insight in 2007 and was Chief Risk Officer for Zurich’s Global Corporate and Commercial Insurance businesses from 2009 to 2017. He took on his current role in 2018. John leads the Group’s engagement on sustainability risk, both internally and externally as the way Zurich delivers its purpose and values.

For the last fifteen years, in his roles as CRO for Commercial Insurance and as Head of Sustainability Risk, John has increasingly focused on global risks, in particular climate change risk. His unique combination of previous roles and experiences in the oil & gas and chemicals industries, together with his involvement in many industry and Government organisations, has given him a deep understanding of the risks and opportunities that climate change and nature present to companies, governments, and society at large.

John is on the Advisory Board to the World Economic Forum (WEF) Global Risks Report and has contributed to every WEF Global Risk Report since 2005. He is also on the WEF Advisory Board for the Energy Transition Initiative and the IEA (International Energy Agency) Finance Institution Advisory Board, fostering a dialogue between the IEA and the finance community on clean energy transitions. In the UK John is an Honorary Professor at the Bartlett School of Sustainable Construction at University College London (UCL) and is a member of the Expert Advisory Group (EAG) on Sustainability for the Institute of Directors.

He has contributed to industry and Government policy on climate change and green finance, through many organisations including the Bank of England Climate Financial Risk Forum, the UK Government’s Green Finance Taskforce, the UNEP FI working group on TCFD, the CRO Forum, the Geneva Association, the UN-convened Net Zero Asset Owners Alliance, where he leads the Engagement Track / Positions focus area. John is also Deputy Chair of Climatewise and the Cambridge Institute of Sustainability Leadership (CISL) Insurance Advisory Council.