There are increasing opportunities to deliver sustainable and impactful investment expertise to our clients and stakeholders across a broad range of growth themes.

As a first step in that effort, we have established a sustainable finance business unit, the first of its kind in Africa. The unit is responsible for partnering with our businesses to better serve our clients, drive innovation and capture emerging opportunities as sustainable growth becomes increasingly important for investors, institutions and companies globally.

• We provided a sustainability-linked funding solution to Curro schools – the first sustainable finance deal in the African market. Curro is the leading for-profit independent school provider in Southern Africa. The sustainability-linked loan will enable the building of additional schools and development of existing campuses. The R500 million five-year loan is linked to achieving pre-agreed environmental, social impact and governance targets and performance, which will be measured by an external ESG rating agency. Target areas include diversity programmes, data privacy and reduction in CO₂ emissions.
• We played a key role in arranging the first ever green bond in East Africa. Nairobi-based property developer Acorn Group has issued a bond to raise KES4.3 billion (R611 million) in project finance over five years for environmentally-friendly student accommodation in the city. Standard Bank Group, via Stanbic Bank Kenya Limited and SBG Securities Limited, acted as lead arranger and placing agent for the bond. The bond has been certified as green by the Climate Bonds Initiative as it meets international green building standards, which are designed to achieve savings on energy usage and water consumption through the building materials used. The finance that is raised via the bond will be used to fund six purpose-built student accommodation properties in Nairobi with a capacity of over 5 000 beds.

The eligibility and qualification criteria or range of supportive products include projects related to:

Renewable energy

Pollution prevention and control

Climate change adaptation

Energy efficiency

Green buildings

Clean transportation

Environmentally sustainable management of living natural resources and land use

Terrestrial and aquatic biodiversity conservation

Sustainable water and wastewater management

Electricity distribution networks

Affordable housing

Health and education infrastructure

Improved access to funding for SMEs and micro-businesses

Projects that aim to improve inclusion of women and minority groups in education systems, and projects that aim to provide women, womenowned enterprises and minority groups with access to financial services, including affordable credit.

Sustainable trade finance

Banks and corporates face a growing demand from shareholders, clients, investors and other stakeholders, for their trade finance transactions to actively support the production of goods or services in a manner that minimises adverse environmental and social impacts and promotes environmental and social benefits.

The group has been working with the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) Banking Commission, co-leading a working group tasked with equipping banks to encourage sustainable finance trade practices.

Standard Bank’s commitment to the ICC Banking Commission’s sustainable trade finance process dovetails with the aims of the African Union’s Agenda 2063 which highlights the need for trade and investment infrastructure to connect Africa. As an African bank clear in its purpose to drive Africa’s growth, partnering with the ICC to develop standards and rules in trade, in general, and universally adopted global best practice in sustainable trade finance specifically, supports our purpose to facilitate trade and investment flows between African countries, and between African countries and global markets in a way that promotes sustainable and inclusive economic growth.

Cumulative green vs Brown underwrite value Of energy investments From 2012 – 2019

GREEN – Annual cumulative underwrite from 2012 – 2019 of project finance power generation transactions directed toward green energy. This includes clean, non-polluting and renewable energy sources that are naturally replenished over time, e.g. solar or wind.

BROWN – Annual cumulative underwrite from 2012 – 2019 of project finance power generation transactions directed toward brown energy, derived from conventional fossil fuel-based energy sources that release pollutants during processing and are finite/not replenished over time, e.g. coal, oil or natural gas.

Estimated jobs created from standard bank’s Investments in south african renewable Energy projects (2012 – 2019)

		PV			CSP			Wind			Total
Construction (direct)		6 264			2 719			4 116			13 099
Construction (supplier)		3 530			994			2 900			7 424
Construction total		9 794			3713			7 016			20 523
Operations (direct)		673			117			715			1 505
Operations (supplier)		113			13			45			171
Operations total		786			130			760			1 676
Total jobs		10 580			3 842			7 776			22 199

References
Macroeconomic assumptions from Department of Energy Integrated Energy Plan Average capacity factors from statistics of utility-scale solar PV, wind and CSP in South Africa in 2017 by CSIR Energy Centre

Estimated households equivalent powered From standard bank's investments
In south african renewable energy projects from 2012 – 2019

Photovoltaics (PV)

 

399 091

Concentrated Solar Power (CSP)

71 147

Wind

 

514 661

Total households

 

984 900