Advancing sustainable finance in Singapore: The finance industry’s role in promoting equality, fair practices, and a just transition

Singapore is a major financial hub in Asia from which large amounts of lending and investments flow towards its Asian neighbors. Fair Finance Asia’s report - The Asian Web: Tracking regional financial flows - highlights the importance of the role ofSingapore finance in ASEAN, especially in key sectors namely, agriculture, infrastructure, power generation, and extractives.

Given the increased attention on ESG, it is important for the Singapore financial sector to deepen its commitments and deliver tangible actions towards sustainability, transparency, and accountability that goes beyond‘E’ (environment). How well it integrates the ‘S’ (social) criteria  is also of paramount importance.

On 15 September, Fair FinanceAsia together with Eco-Business will host a closed-door roundtable titled Advancing sustainable finance in Singapore: The finance industry’s role in promoting equality, fair practices, and a just transition’.

This dialogue, as part ofEco-Business’ annual flagship event, Unlocking Capital for Sustainability 2021: Scaling Sustainable Finance for a Green Recovery, aims to bring together leaders, innovators, and disruptors from the financial sector to strengthen the integration of the “S” criteria under ESG (environmental, social, and  governance standards) in their financing decisions.

Fair Finance Asia (FFA)will  share highlights and lessons learned from over 12 years of applying the Fair Finance GuideInternational Methodology as a benchmarking tool to assess the quality of sustainability strategies and policies of financial institutions across Asia, Europe, andLatin America.

The Guide provides practical advice on how financial institutions (banks and insurers) can integrate ESG criteria in their lending and financing strategies as well as ensure that the sustainable finance policies of banks are aligned with  international responsible business and sustainability standards. ‍

Note: This is a by-invitation-only event. If you represent a financial institution in Singapore and wish to attend, please write to us Nirnita.Talukdar@oxfam.org, or Monique.Armstrong@eco-business.com

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