Laura Savikoski heads KPMG Finland’s Climate Services, as part of the ESG team’s overall sustainability offering. Her study background is in law, and she specialises in climate and environmental law.
Laura Savikoski:
“In a nutshell, we help our clients include climate perspectives in their business decisions. At a more detailed level, our services include carbon footprint and handprint calculations, strategic approaches to climate change and decarbonisation, climate roadmaps and goal setting based on Science-Based Targets, evaluating the climate business risks and opportunities using the TCFD framework, and services connected with emissions compensation, carbon sinks and removals, for example.
Our understanding of climate impact has evolved tremendously in recent years, and all corporate business today is affected by the need to mitigate and adapt to climate change.
We have a wide range of clients, from listed companies and financial institutions to small and medium businesses. Regardless of the industry or service, being science-based is an important theme, both in our engagements and for clients.
We base our work on established KPMG tools and methodologies, as well as external collaboration. An example of the latter is work related to credible carbon removal programmes and measurement in collaboration with Climate Analytics Finland and the University of Helsinki’s climate scientists, which enables business advice based on solid scientific research.
The impact of our work for clients is an inspiring and interesting topic. As an ESG professionals team, we are net positive from a climate perspective. We also support our firm internally in KPMG’s own climate work.
However, our main impact comes from client engagement. Climate matters are business matters, and we help bring them to the appropriate place on the agenda in the organisations with which we work.
Moreover, when we advise investors, we help them understand the relevance of climate matters, which in turn may affect the allocation of capital in investments and throughout the economy.
The most rewarding – and at the same time, most challenging – part of our job is the speed and scale at which things can change. In recent months, KPMG has participated in the UN-led COP15 on Biodiversity and COP27 on Climate. In the same period, significant updates also took place in the European Union’s emissions trading regulation (EU ETS), and an agreement on the carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM) was reached – and this is just scratching the surface. It is extremely motivating to be able to support our clients with the new developments, and at the same time, it is exciting to navigate in a field that is in a state of constant change.”
