A central role for boards is a critical component of ESG standards, an EY executive told Insider. This article is part of the "Financing a Sustainable Future" series exploring how companies take steps to set and fund sustainable goals. In the evolving field of environmental, social, and governance, or ESG, governance is perhaps the most critical pillar for setting and executing sustainability objectives. But governance can also be abstract, compared with sustainability metrics like carbon emissions or data measuring a company's diversity. Environmental issues and corporate governance often intersect at the top.

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