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StanChart taps UK diplomat to strengthen sustainability team
John Murton named senior sustainability adviser to help develop and enhance public-private partnerships on sustainable finance
The Asset 9 Jan 2023
John Murton
John Murton

Standard Chartered has appointed John Murton as senior sustainability adviser within its chief sustainability officer (CSO) team.

In this capacity, Murton serves as a senior ambassador for the bank, helping to develop and enhance strategic governmental, civil society and private sector relationships, with a focus on public-private partnerships aimed at catalyzing sustainable finance in its footprint markets.

Based in London, Murton reports directly to Marisa Drew, chief sustainability officer, and is responsible for helping to execute on the bank’s sustainability strategy, including proactively advancing its JETP work and playing a central role in its agenda to support the energy transition and early coal decommissioning in developing markets.

Murton has a distinguished diplomatic career spanning 25 years, including posts in Asia and Africa and with an emphasis on energy transition and climate. He joins Standard Chartered after three successful years in his most recent role as the UK government’s COP26 envoy, coordinating the country’s climate diplomacy for COP26 in Glasgow. He oversaw the World Leaders Summit element of COP26, led negotiations for the international community on the US$8.5 billion South African and US$15 billion Vietnamese Just Energy Transition Partnerships (JETPs), and spearheaded diplomatic efforts to deliver the Clean Energy Transition Partnership, which commits 35 nations to ending all international support for fossil fuels.

Murton was appointed CMG (Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George) for services to climate change and foreign policy in the recent New Year’s Honours list.

Prior to this, Murton served as the UK ambassador to six African nations, including the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mauritius and Madagascar, and was the UK’s permanent representative to the UN Environment Programme in Nairobi. He was previously head of the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office’s East Asia and Pacific Department, overseeing the UK’s diplomatic relations with countries of Asean, North East Asia and the Pacific. Earlier in his career, he was also the UK’s energy and environment attaché in Tokyo.

Murton completed his undergraduate studies in geography at the University of Cambridge and went on to do his PhD jointly at the University of Cambridge and University of Nairobi, focusing on an economic and environmental analysis of rural Eastern Kenya.

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