Nest is on track to have completely divested from the tobacco industry within the next two months, around a year ahead of schedule.

Speaking at the launch of the Make My Money Matter campaign, Nest CEO, Helen Dean, confirmed that the group was on track to meet its target of going tobacco free within the next two months.

She stated: “We set ourselves a target of going tobacco free last year and we said we’d do it in two years, and we’ll actually have achieved that in the next two months, which is a full year earlier than we’d anticipated.”

Dean added that the scheme had also taken a “real focus on climate change” with its climate aware fund, established in 2017, having moved over £200m away from pollutant companies and into “companies that are really tackling the challenges” of climate risk.

She explained that this shift in funds had an environmental impact equivalent to taking 44,000 cars of the road, highlighting that the scheme has also invested over £100m in renewable energy sites.

Dean continued: “We want members to have trust and confidence in Nest, we want them to be proud of how we’re investing their hard earned cash, and we know that they really care about society and the environment.”

Nest has seen rapid growth since it's inception and whilst it currently invests around £10bn for members, Dean predicted that this would increase to £15bn by the end of next year, and £100bn by the end of the decade.

The scheme recently acknowledged that whilst other UK pension funds had a sense that it would be “too difficult” to divest from tobacco because of fiduciary duty constraints, the work of Nest has shown that it is possible, emphasising that there has since been interest from other UK pension schemes.

In June 2019, Nest pledged to completely divest from tobacco by 2022, having raised concerns around child labour and environmental issues, as well as falling global smoking rates and stricter regulation.

The scheme, which had around £40m in exposure to tobacco firms at the time, predicted that if it failed to make a change immediately it would have around £120m invested in tobacco by 2022.

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