The Main Thing Is to Keep the Main Thing as the Main Thing: Key Takeaways from Istanbul
A message from IAIA CEO Gary Baker
I recently had an opportunity to attend the 2025 Annual Meeting of the Equator Principles (EP) in Istanbul.
This was the first time the EP group has broadened its invite list beyond its member financial institutions into the wider E&S community, spanning IFC, EBRD, OECD, consultants, and technical specialists — 110 representatives from 50 EPFIs were in attendance, joined by 60 additional guests.
It was great to be invited — the meeting provided a unique opportunity for IAIA to engage with many of the power users and some of the most experienced proponents of global Environmental and Social Impact Assessment practice. I certainly came away from the meeting feeling optimistic about the opportunities to extend our training and development activities into this group, particularly with respect to social assessment, where a lack of high-quality training was consistently noted.
Unsurprisingly, interest in AI discussions was very high, reflecting the current, seemingly inexhaustible demand for AI data center financing (and associated power facilities). Whether these types of projects actually present unique, specific IA challenges beyond their absolute scale and volume was a live debate.
IFC provided an update on its Performance Standards refresh (these are the basis for the EP Principles). While much of the IFC discussion was held in the closed EPFI session, the elephant in the room is clearly (to mix metaphors) how IFC will square the circle of the acknowledged need for greater focus on climate risks, human rights, and community engagement, versus the very clear hawkish rhetoric from the US administration on these very issues. It feels like publication timelines could be slipping.
Many headlines have been written about the death of ESG in the wake of regulatory rollback in a number of countries, but the mood of the EP room reflected a clear determination to focus the profession on the core essential framework of E&S risk management for project-related finance, for which demand is both robust and growing, particularly in the power, mining, and infrastructure sectors.
Istanbul is a perfect location to reflect on the art (and science) of resiliency and risk management as it straddles East and West. But this emphasis on risk management is worth emphasizing as a North Star for impact assessment (despite cardinal point overload); it reminds me of a Stephen Covey quote that “the main thing is to keep the main thing as the main thing.”
While the EP network, in common with a number of alliances, has lost North American banks in the past year, this has been balanced by new signatories from Asia and other regions, taking global membership past 125 FIs. Add to that the extended ecosystem of consultants, MDBs, and technical specialists, and these are our key audiences with whom we aim to collaborate going forward.
