"I’m excited about this new challenge to evolve, strengthen, and implement responsible investing as an asset owner, for the benefit of our customers."
- Eva Cairns, incoming Head of Responsible Investment & Stewardship at Scottish Widows
Prior to this appointment, Eva Cairns worked as Head of Sustainability Insights & Climate Strategy at abrdn after several promotions from Managing Business Analyst. In this role, Eva was responsible for leading the firm’s sustainability research team and climate strategy for investments. During this time, she co-authored various climate-related papers on net zero investing, climate scenario analysis, and the credibility of net-zero targets.
Eva has been actively involved in driving forward best practices in investment across the pensions industry, advocating for a policy environment that enables investing in line with sustainability goals.
“We’re aiming to halve the carbon intensity of all our investments by 2030 on our path to net zero by 2050 or sooner, and we’ve already beaten out 2025 target – investing over £1.3bn in climate solutions,” said Kevin Doran, Chief Investment Officer at Scottish Widows. He believes Eva’s expertise and knowledge of the sector will be “extremely valuable in helping us achieve on our ambitious strategy and we’re looking forward to working together on making ESG central to our future success.”
Eva said she’s been “impressed by the leading stance Scottish Widows has taken on responsible investing and I’m looking forward to working with all the fantastic people I’ve met so far.”
