The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation says that its investment practices have little or no impact on social issues. The principles of socially responsible investing (SRI) and shareholder activism don’t work for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation – the largest in the world – according to Patty Stonesifer, the foundation’s CEO. Stonesifer put forth the position following publication of a two-part Los Angeles Times investigation, which claimed that hundreds of Gates Foundation investments – ‘totaling $8.7 billion, or 41 percent of its assets, not including U.S. and foreign government securities’ – have been in companies that ‘contribute to the problems of health, housing and social welfare that the foundation tries to solve.’ Among examples cited by the Times: a polio and measles vaccination program in Nigeria, supported by the Gates Foundation, which takes place amidst pollution filled with ‘toxic byproducts’ from nearby petroleum plants – owned by oil companies in which the Gates Foundation has invested $423 million. In the United States, the Times said, the Gates Foundation has invested heavily in finance companies with predatory lending practices and a healthcare company accused of medical lapses and fraud. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation endowment […]