Review of the Equator Principles – Phase III

8 October 2018

The EP Association is making tangible progress with the targeted update of the EPs, with a draft set of ‘EP4’ thematic proposals for members to debate at the upcoming Annual Meeting.

The first round of stakeholder consultation has now been completed. As communicated on the EP website previously, Phase II of the EP4 update process entailed focused EP Association group work and internal discussion on key topics and thematic areas, as well as external Stakeholder Consultation, and lasted from March – September 2018. The EP Association appreciated receiving feedback from a diverse group of stakeholders, and would like to express our thanks for the input received. An independent third party (ERM) was engaged in May to undertake a review covering elements of the wider EP strategy and the targeted EP4 update. ERM led the external Stakeholder Consultation process, which included interviews, an online survey, and written feedback via the EP website was conducted with a diverse group of stakeholders representing regulators, academia, financial institutions, clients, industry associations and civil society groups.

Taking stakeholders’ views and expectations into consideration, member-led working groups have been active developing and reviewing thematic proposals on changed wording. Proposed draft changes to the EP text have been developed for the following target areas:

• Social Risk (social impact and human rights)
• Climate Change
• Designated Countries and applicable standards, and
• Scope of Applicability of the EPs.

The Association has now moved into Phase III of the update process as we share detailed working group proposals with the wider EPFI membership. The proposals are being shared through the EP Association regional groups and detailed discussions will occur at the upcoming Annual Meeting during October 2018. An update will be shared by the Association after the event*.

A second round of public and stakeholder consultation is planned for early 2019 (indicatively February – May 2019), which will be conducted on the basis of the draft changes to the EP text.

Any interested organisation or individual is invited to subscribe to news alerts, and to submit feedback via the online web form. All subscribers to the EP4 mailing list will receive notice when consultation on the draft text is announced.

For more information, to submit feedback and sign up to news alerts, please go to: http://equator-principles.com/ep4/.

Tags: Review of the Equator Principles

* Following the 2017 EP AGM and as part of the announcement of the EP4 update process, the EP Association discussed developing a clarification note regarding application of the EPs in Designated Countries. As EP4 update working group discussions began, it became clear that our efforts should focus on the longer update process, as a quick agreement on clarifications for Designated Countries would distract from the work needed to develop the EP4 draft. All work on updating our approach in Designated Countries will be reflected in the EP4 update rather than in an interim clarification note.