The Towards Sustainability Labelling Agency
The Towards Sustainability Labelling Agency (CLA) is a not-for-profit association incorporated under Belgian law. Its goal is to enlarge the impact and substance of sustainable saving and investing. And to substantially strengthen the qualitative approach to sustainable financial products.
Board of directors
The CLA is governed by a Board of Directors consisting of members from outside the financial sector, e.g. academia and civil society, and members from the financial sector. The number of Financial Sector Directors cannot exceed the number of Independent Directors.
Tasks
The Board of Directors is responsible for all the tasks and duties conferred to it under the Code of Companies and Associations (the “CCA”) and the articles of association. All board members should uphold the highest standards of integrity and probity. In addition, the Board of Directors has three main tasks.
Supervise the CLA
The Board of Directors supervises the operations of the CLA and the procedures governing the labelling process. It so ensures the proper functioning and credibility of the ‘Towards Sustainability’ label. The Board may initiate and decide upon any actions towards realising the aims of the CLA.
Update the Quality Standard
The Board of Directors ensures that the Quality Standard remains compatible with regulatory and market developments. The Board of Directors decides upon changes to the Quality Standard, after consultation of the Advisory Commission and based on proposals by the Eligibility Commission.
Award the label
The Board of Directors decides on the awarding of the ‘Towards Sustainability’ label to individual products, based on the advice received from the Eligibility Commission. In its decision-making the Board of Directors will focus on safeguarding the internal coherence of the advices received from the Eligibility Commission and on the integrity of the awarding process.
Independent directors
Olivier Marquet - Chair
Until recently, Olivier was Director General of UNICEF Belgium and before he was Managing Director of Triodos Bank Belgium (2003-2015). During his time at Triodos, he gave more than 100 conferences on sustainable finance and gave his advice to a number of social and environmental associations. With a long career and expertise in sustainable investment, he is currently member of the advisory committee of the Louvain School of Management and of the King Baudouin Foundation.
Ben Granjé
(Beconomics/VFB)Ben holds a Master of Psychology from Ghent University and is the owner of Beconomics, a consulting firm dedicated to Investor Education & Behaviour. He is CEO and board member for the Individual Investor Federation in Belgium VFB VZW (Vlaamse Federatie van Beleggers) and holds additional mandates in several investment-related bodies, such as the H2020-Level EEI project team & advisory council, and the ESMA Stakeholders Group. Prior experience includes over a decade at Morningstar and several years in Banking/Investment Advisory. Ben is co-author of several investment books and a speaker at international investment conferences (often on Sustainable investment).
Vincent de Brouwer
Vincent has an engineering background. He has worked in several sectors, from banking to environmental protection, development cooperation and impact finance, building bridges between sectors that don't otherwise talk easily to each other. He has always been driven by the conviction that finance is a major lever to spearhead societal change. In his last executive position, until June 2024, Vincent was country manager for LITA.co, a crowdfunding platform that is exclusively dedicated to companies with a high environmental or societal value.
Dieter Vander Beke
(ICDO/FIDO)Dieter is Managing Director of the Belgian Federal Institute for Sustainable Development (FISD), the successor of the Public Planning Service for Sustainable Development (PSS SD). After working for a decade in different ministerial cabinets and the administration as policy advisor on social economy and sustainable development, he started work for the PSS SD in 2008 to coordinate the Sustainable Production and Consumption unit.
Antoon Vandevelde
(KU Leuven)Antoon is an economist and a philosopher. He became emeritus professor at KU Leuven in October 2017 and continues his research and teaching. His great number of publications includes articles and books mainly in the field of economic ethics and political philosophy. He was full professor at the Institute of Philosophy of KU Leuven. Between 2007 and 2014, he was Dean of the Institute.
Christel Dumas
(ICHEC Brussels)Christel teaches Finance at ICHEC Brussels Management School. She holds a PhD in Applied Economics from Ghent University. Her research activities focus on sustainable finance, impact investing and the integration of ESG (Environment, Society, Governance) concerns into the financial practices of institutional investors.
Christel is currently a member of the Advisory Board of several financial institutions and of the Supervisory Board of Impact Finance Belgium.
Financial sector directors
Karel Baert
(Febelfin)Karel is CEO of Febelfin, the Belgium federation of the financial sector. Before joining Febelfin he was Partner with Egon Zehnder, a global leadership advisory firm where he was a core member of their Financial Services and Public Sector Practice Groups serving banks, supervisors and multilateral organizations on an international basis. Karel started his career as an attorney and afterwards held management and board positions at Deutsche Bank, Bpost and Bpost Bank.
Marc Van de Gucht
(BEAMA)Marc is Director Asset Management & Private Banking at Febelfin, the Belgium federation of the financial sector and Director General of BEAMA, the Belgian Asset Managers Association (BEAMA). Before joining Febelfin he was 5 years Director at Compagnie de Banque Privée Quilvest (CBP Quilvest). He started his career in the dealing room of a Japanese bank and afterwards joined the Belgian Banking & Finance Commission (now FSMA) where he worked for 24 years in various positions, specialising in private banks and asset management companies. He’s also visiting lecturer at the EHSAL Management School where he teaches in the postgraduate program “asset management “. He’s a board member of EFAMA, the European Asset Managers Association.
Tom Van den Berghe
(Febelfin)Tom is Director Sustainable Finance at Febelfin, the Belgian federation of the financial sector. In his current role, he led the development of the Towards Sustainability Quality Standard and label. He is also responsible for a wide range of sustainable finance issues, going from sustainable lending and investing, ESG data collection, circular economy and biodiversity. He studied philosophy and started his career at the Belgian Asset Managers Association (BEAMA).
Bart Vandermeiren
(Assuralia)Bart is Director of the Life and Health Insurance Department and member of the Management Board of Assuralia, the professional association of insurance and reinsurance companies operating in Belgium. Thanks to his actuarial background combined with his more than two decades of expertise in life and pension insurance issues, he serves also as an active member of the Advisory Commission of Supplementary Pensions, and of the National Pension Committee of the Belgian Government.
Thomas Wulf
(Belsipa)Thomas is Secretary General of the European Structured Investment Products Association (EUSIPA), a role in which he also covers the management of the Belgian Structured Investment Products Association (BELSIPA). Thomas, a lawyer by profession, has worked for many years at Linklaters, a major global law firm where until 2012 he was Head of Business Development, first for Belgium, then for Western Europe. He provides for an expertise in European law, capital markets law (derivatives side), corporate governance and international relations.