The world's local bank
Our sustainable approach to banking
We believe long-term success and good corporate behaviour are linked. Corporate Sustainability has been a vital ingredient in HSBC’s 140 years of success.
We have always maintained that a company’s first social responsibility is to be successful. Success allows us to invest in new products and services for our customers. It enables us to pay the dividends which form an important part of the long-term savings and pension plans of our shareholders. It allows us to contribute to public services through the taxes we pay to governments. It creates jobs for our colleagues and suppliers.
To ensure our approach to lending and investment reflects our business principles and values, sensitivity to society’s expectations and an assessment of risk, we:
- have adopted the Equator Principles - a set of voluntary guidelines developed to address the environmental and social issues that arise in financing projects - in September 2003.
- have published five sector guidelines & policies to complement our Environmental Risk Standard (1 page pdf 9k) published in 2002.
- are looking to develop sustainability-focused business in a number of areas, particularly low carbon energy, water infrastructure, sustainable forestry and related agricultural commodities. We also provide a range of sustainable & responsible investment (SRI) funds.
- avoid certain types of business, such as financing weapons manufacture and sales, dealing with countries subject to international sanctions, and transactions that might be used to evade tax or to launder earnings from crime.
- HSBC Group Investment Businesses are signatories to the United Nations Principles for Responsible Investment. These commit institutional investors to incorporate environmental, social and governance considerations into investment analysis, decision-making and ownership practices.
HSBC recognises the potential for developing sustainability-focused business in a number of areas, particularly low carbon energy, water infrastructure, sustainable forestry and related agricultural commodities. We identify these business development opportunities by geography, industry sector and customer group.
We seek to identify low carbon projects globally, but especially in our key emerging markets – China, India, Brazil and Mexico. By funding or investing in these projects, we will secure carbon credits to offset our own carbon emissions, and ensure they are environmentally credible, incremental and cost effective. We will maintain our carbon neutrality through our core business of lending and investment.
We provide a range of sustainable & responsible investment funds and are reviewing opportunities in energy-efficient loans, mortgages, credit cards and savings products.
2007 Sustainability Report
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