How do you get companies to become more sustainable? Silke Stremlau knows it. As a student, she chained herself to nuclear waste transport; today she advises the federal government on green finance.
Silke Stremlau, 47, has been chairwoman of the Federal Government’s Sustainable Finance Advisory Board since 2022. 34 representatives from business, science, finance and society work here on a voluntary and non-partisan basis on questions about sustainable finance. Stremlau has also been on the supervisory board of UmweltBank since 2019. She lives on the outskirts of Hanover and is the mother of a son.
© Jürgen Heinrich / imago images
BRIGITTE: When I put my money in If I invest in funds or ETFs, I can see which companies my money is going into. But what about savings accounts? Does sustainability also play a role?
Silke Stremlau: Absolutely, because when we talk about sustainable investments, it’s always about where the money goes. Banks use the money that customers store with them to grant new loans, for example to the local economy. And they can be more or less sustainable: a loan for a solar system for a craft business or for a less sustainable project, such as a new pig farm. If you want to be on the safe side, you should have your savings account at a bank with a sustainable business model– they sometimes even publish all the loans they grant.
You have been concerned with environmental policy issues since your early youth. What sparked your interest in it so early?
This is clear to me from my biography. I was born in 1976. When I was in fourth grade, the Chernobyl reactor exploded. An entire region in the middle of Europe was contaminated and this also had consequences here in Münsterland. Suddenly I was no longer allowed to play outside and we no longer bought mushrooms. My parents were afraid of something we couldn’t see, feel or smell: dangerous radiation. The word “catastrophe” kept coming up. I didn’t understand it when I was ten, but I remember the changes in my everyday life.
You decided to become politically active as a teenager. Was the Chernobyl trauma a deciding factor?
Yes and no. My parents weren’t eco-friendly, but there was a strong belief in our family that everyone can do something if something goes wrong. When I was 13, in 1989, all this packaging waste annoyed me. I put a notice on the bulletin board at school, “Who wants to start an environmental group?” A few school friends got in touch and after a short time we had collected more than 1,000 signatures and handed over the lists against rubbish to the management of the three local supermarkets.
You studied environmental sciences in Oldenburg and completed an internship at Greenpeace. Things got more uncomfortable then, didn’t they?
During my first week of internship, I and some Greenpeace colleagues chained myself to a nuclear waste freighter in the pouring rain in a night-and-fog operation in Emden. That was pretty exciting, but it was over pretty quickly. After a short time the police were in the harbor, untied us and took our personal details. Nevertheless, the media response was great: The “Tagesschau” and the “heute” news showed a photo of me hanging chained to the freighter. I was really proud and called my parents straight away. At first they thought I might have given an interview. No, I’m attached to a freighter – they were somewhat shocked. (laughs)
That an environmental activist who chained herself to a nuclear waste carrier is today the… Federal Government advises on financial issues is remarkable. When did the change of heart happen?
In my first years of working at the sustainability agency “Imug”, I learned that you can achieve a lot in companies without chaining yourself to the factory gate. Investors have a lot of power, and for good, if compliance with environmental, climate and social standards is important to them. “Imug” examines listed companies and creates ESG ratings that investors use as a guide if they want to channel their money specifically into sustainable companies. I was there for 15 years, then I moved to the Hannoversche Kassen as a board member. This is a pension fund with strict sustainable guidelines, so I got to know the perspective of the sustainable investor there.
So your career has always been about the question: How does sustainable investing work?
Exactly. I even gave up my position on the board in the summer of 2023 after five years because I wanted to devote myself entirely to the topic. Now, as a Fellow of the Mercator Foundation, I can spend a year researching how to ensure that initiatives like the Sustainable Finance Advisory Board lead to lasting changes.
Anyone who blocks the factory gate stops operations and draws a lot of attention to the matter. Can we really have a similar impact with our private investments?
Definitely! For example, if I own shares, I own part of the company and have a say. Of course, the more shares, the more important my vote becomes. But owning stocks is not a game of roulette. Private investors with just a few shares can also attend a shareholder meeting and vote against decisions. Or transfer their voting rights to non-governmental organizations such as the Critical Shareholders. They pool voting rights and can thus exert greater influence on companies.
What if I hold shares in a US company? Or own shares in a fund? Then it shouldn’t work.
Correct. That’s why it’s worth investing in funds from sustainable banks and making sure that they have a so-called engagement strategy: Does the fund management actively enter into dialogue with companies that are in the portfolio and demand more sustainability? Does the bank that launched the fund talk to companies that did not make it into the fund and work with them to resolve the problems? This engagement takes place in background conversations, it is not about pointing the finger at anyone. The idea behind it is: those who do not publicly accuse have more influence. So it’s more of a kind of diplomacy.
You will certainly need diplomacy and negotiating skills on the Federal Government’s Sustainable Finance Advisory Board…
You can say that out loud. Sometimes 70 people sit at one table. The members of the advisory board then discuss with employees from the finance, environment and economics ministries, for example, which regulatory projects are effective or which types of financing make the economy more sustainable. Or we look at the effectiveness of the EU taxonomy, which is intended to ensure that as much money as possible flows into sustainable economic activities.
Discussing regulatory proposals… Sounds pretty dry.
What makes it interesting is the relationship of trust that develops. Everyone knows that when the advisory board represents a position, many perspectives are incorporated, from business, science and society. This makes it more likely that our results will also be acceptable to the majority in society. We give ministry representatives a view of reality that they would otherwise not get, unfiltered – and without lobbying interests.
You are currently working on a government seal of quality for financial products, similar to the Nutri-Score on food. Why do we need this?
It’s really difficult to understand: which fund is sustainable? What is greenwashing? How do the funds compare? Although there are many rankings, there is currently no uniform government seal of approval for all financial products. We want to change that and are working on an ESG scale that will assess the sustainability of financial products from one to seven across the EU. Regardless of whether it is a savings account, fund or checking account: Everyone should be able to see and compare at first glance whether and how sustainable the product is. There are European elections in 2024 and we hope that implementation will begin afterwards. Doing politics means drilling thick boards, so it’s not that easy. But we’re sticking with it.
Tips from Silke Stremlau
Sustainable funds: The Stiftung Warentest financial test rating examined sustainability funds in September 2023. This is a reliable and up-to-date source of information (test.de). The FNG seal also provides information about how green a fund really is (fng-siegel.org).
Sustainable Accounts: The Fair Finance Guide annually evaluates banks such as savings banks, cooperative banks and commercial banks based on their sustainable criteria and their implementation (fairfinanceguide.de). My personal tip: Customers are in the best hands with a sustainability bank.
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