Adrian Bertrand is a governance and sustainable finance executive based in Cape Town, South Africa, with 17+ years’ experience across the retirement fund, responsible investment and ESG ecosystem. He built the ESG function at the Government Employees Pension Fund, Africa’s largest pension fund (ZAR 2.7 trillion, approximately US$164 billion), and served twice as Head: Africa & Middle East for the UN-supported Principles for Responsible Investment, where he led signatory growth and engagement across the region.

In 2022, Adrian chaired the CRISA 2 Review Working Group and served as project lead for South Africa’s revised stewardship code — a multi-year, multi-stakeholder process that reset expectations for institutional investor stewardship in the market. He is Co-Founder of Six Capitals ESG Advisory and Atleha-edu NPC, an Independent Committee Member of the Acorn Agri & Food Fund’s Compliance, Social & Ethics Committee. He formerly served as an Advisory Committee Member of the Pan African Infrastructure Development Fund I (2011–2014). Adrian has served as an Independent Judge for the ICGN Global Stewardship Disclosure Awards since 2020 and is a Member of the ICGN Global Stewardship Codes Network.

Adrian Bertrand

v0726

Adrian Bertrand

Will Farrell

Federated Hermes
Assistant Manager, EOS
London

Will co-leads the climate change theme at EOS, the stewardship arm of Federated Hermes Limited, where his coverage includes companies in Europe and Australia, primarily financial services, energy, chemicals, and materials. Prior to joining EOS, Will worked in the energy and infrastructure investment banking team at Macquarie Capital, where he specialised in renewable energy. Before that, Will held a number of roles across the UK climate policy space, including as a parliamentary researcher for Rt. Hon. Chris Skidmore MP on climate and energy issues, and as a climate and economic policy analyst at a diplomatic institute. He was appointed as a voluntary adviser to Rt. Hon. Alok Sharma MP, President of COP26, on preparations for COP26 after co-founding a Westminster climate policy group in 2019, which engaged MPs and Members of the House of Lords to advocate for more ambition on climate action in public policy. Will has a Bachelor’s degree (1st Class Honours) in Economics from the London School of Economics and Political Science.