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In 2024, Global Finance magazine honored SHB for the second consecutive year, being the only representative in the Asia-Pacific region in the category of Best Bank in Sustainable Finance.
Besides its policies, governance goals, and measurable achievements in sustainable finance, Global Finance highly appreciated SHB‘s community responsibility projects, notably the “Supporting women-owned businesses to mitigate the impact of COVID-19”, funded by the ADB. By the end of 2022, SHB led among the 5 banks participating in the project to date with a total amount of non-refundable aid from ADB to directly support customers of up to 1.7 million USD USD.
SHB was also honored by Asiamoney magazine and FinanceAsia magazine with the “Best Bank for ESG Impact Vietnam” award for its positive impacts on the environment, society, and governance. At the Green Economic Forum for a Sustainable Developing Country organized by the Vietnam Environment Association, SHB was ranked in the Top 10 green and sustainably developing enterprises, as well as in the Top 10 banks with effective capital mobilization for energy projects in Vietnam 2017-2021 by the Vietnam Energy Association.
Promoting green capital, SHB accompanies the country’s sustainable development.
As an important financial provider of the economy, the banking system in general and SHB in particular always determine the role and responsibility in “greening” capital for the goal of sustainable development, actively accompanying the Government towards the goal of climate change response.
With the position of being a private joint-stock commercial bank in the top 4, always accompanying the sustainable development of the country, in the past time, SHB has focused on promoting capital financing in the fields of agriculture, forestry, food processing, industry, especially investing in green energy projects, renewable energy, infrastructure development, and building a circular economy for key regions across the country.
“For 2 consecutive years, surpassing 13 countries and territories in the Asia-Pacific region to win the “Best Sustainable Finance Bank” award, SHB has affirmed the right direction in meeting and following the guidelines on promoting green credit such as the guidelines of the IFC and the SBV to manage environmental risks in lending activities; on that basis, building regulations on management of environmental and social risks in lending activities at the bank”, shared a SHB representative.
SHB applies a set of environmental and social risk assessment tools with many strict criteria issued by the State Bank and IFC. Therefore, projects receiving capital must meet strict conditions according to domestic and international standards on environmental protection, energy and resource saving. Not only providing capital support, SHB also accompanies project owners through technical safety consulting, capacity building, etc., contributing to helping customers meet the requirements of international organizations, providing carbon financing programs, training programs, loan guarantees.
“We aim for green credit at SHB within the next 5 years to account for 10% of the bank’s total outstanding loans. This is quite a challenging goal, but it affirms SHB‘s sustainable commitment to a long-term, stable development strategy, responding to the country’s policies, along with the Prime Minister’s commitment at the COP26 conference, bringing net emissions to “0” by 2050”, emphasized the SHB representative.
Recognizing the importance of sustainable development early on, 10 years ago, SHB had already cooperated with international partners such as the WB, IFC, ADB, and is continuing to strengthen to seek long-term preferential capital sources, providing consulting on safety and techniques to support customers and SHB in effectively implementing and financing projects.
In addition, SHB has increased capital in projects that accompany national strategies such as sustainable agriculture projects, clean energy, key works, logistics, etc. Some projects have been completed and highly appreciated by experts in the green economy, such as the Hanh Phuc rice factory – the largest scale investment project in Asia in An Giang, which was inaugurated in January 2022.
The factory was completed thanks to a capital of 1,000 billion VND sponsored by SHB in order to gradually stabilize food security and increase the export value of Vietnam’s agricultural products. The factory operates 100% according to the technological solution imported from Europe, processing rice according to international standards, meeting the world’s strict standards on food safety, being environmentally friendly, and contributing to increasing the value of Vietnamese rice. The factory’s fresh rice drying capacity reaches 4,800 tons/day, milling and processing capacity of about 1,600 tons/day, the total finished rice capacity reaches 1,000 tons/day.
Green energy projects are always SHB‘s choice. The Yang Trung wind power plant, one of the large wind power clusters located in Gia Lai, has a total installed capacity of up to 145 MW, annually contributing nearly 1 million MWh to the national power grid. With 36 wind turbines, the plant records a total expected investment of 6,246 billion VND, a large part of which is funded by SHB.
In the Central Highlands, SHB has also disbursed more than 584 billion VND, equivalent to 70% of the total investment capital of the Dak Sin 1 Hydropower Project. In the Northern and North Central regions, SHB has also poured capital into the Nam Luc Hydropower Plant project (Lao Cai), the Bai Thuong Hydropower Project (Thanh Hoa).
Beside agriculture and clean energy projects, SHB has actively invested in key national projects and logistics projects. In 2013, SHB sponsored 6,200 billion VND for key national infrastructure and transportation projects, such as the three-story flyover at the Hue – Da Nang intersection; the project to expand National Highway 1 through Thua Thien Hue and Khanh Hoa, …
Logistics and seaport transportation are identified as the spearhead economic sectors of the country. To achieve the 6 goals in the “Action Plan to enhance competitiveness and develop Vietnam’s logistics services by 2025” set out by the Government, SHB has provided capital for the Vinh Phuc ICD Logistics Center – the opening project of the ASEAN Smart Logistics Network (ASLN), jointly implemented by Vietnam and Singapore under the promotion of the two Prime Ministers. The project has a scale of 83 ha, a total investment of over 200 million USD, and a designed cargo clearance capacity of about 530,000 TEU/year.
