JavaScript is disabled in your web browser or browser is too old to support JavaScript. Today almost all web pages contain JavaScript, a scripting programming language that runs on visitor's web browser. It makes web pages functional for specific purposes and if disabled for some reason, the content or the functionality of the web page can be limited or unavailable.

Tuesday, July 22, 2025

Republic Bank signs onto UN Principles for Responsible Banking

by

Geisha Kowlessar-Alonzo
1743 days ago
20201013
Republic Bank, Independence Square, Port-of-Spain.

Republic Bank, Independence Square, Port-of-Spain.

Roberto Codallo

Re­pub­lic Fi­nan­cial Hold­ings Lim­it­ed (RFHL) has be­come an of­fi­cial sig­na­to­ry of the Unit­ed Na­tions Prin­ci­ples for Re­spon­si­ble Bank­ing—a sin­gle frame­work for a sus­tain­able bank­ing in­dus­try de­vel­oped through a part­ner­ship with banks world­wide and the Unit­ed Na­tions En­vi­ron­ment Pro­gramme Fi­nance Ini­tia­tive (UN­EP FI).

In a state­ment, RFHL ex­plained the Prin­ci­ples for Re­spon­si­ble Bank­ing set out the bank­ing in­dus­try’s role and re­spon­si­bil­i­ty in shap­ing a sus­tain­able fu­ture and aligns the bank­ing sec­tor with the ob­jec­tives of the UN Sus­tain­able De­vel­op­ment Goals and the 2015 Paris Cli­mate Agree­ment.

These prin­ci­ples en­able a bank to em­bed sus­tain­abil­i­ty across all its busi­ness ar­eas and to iden­ti­fy po­ten­tial op­por­tu­ni­ties to make the most im­pact in con­tribut­ing to a sus­tain­able world.

Nigel Bap­tiste, pres­i­dent and CEO of RFHL, said: “We are proud to be the first sig­na­to­ry in the Eng­lish-Speak­ing Caribbean to the UN­EP FI Prin­ci­ples for Re­spon­si­ble Bank­ing. As we go for­ward at a Group lev­el we in­tend to spread this out, and let Re­pub­lic Bank be the cheer­leader of this ini­tia­tive for the Caribbean.”

Ex­cept for the British Vir­gin Is­lands and An­guil­la, all coun­tries in which RFHL op­er­ates have signed up to the UN Sus­tain­able De­vel­op­ment Goals tar­get and the Paris Cli­mate Agree­ment.

“We will be set­ting tar­gets for the Group that will car­ry us for­ward in­to 2030,” Bap­tiste said, adding that he hopes the or­gan­i­sa­tion will make a dif­fer­ence in pover­ty, ed­u­ca­tion, the role of women in so­ci­ety, cli­mate change, sus­tain­able agri­cul­tur­al prac­tices and the blue econ­o­my and more.

“From a Re­pub­lic Group’s per­spec­tive, our com­mit­ment is to make a pos­i­tive dif­fer­ence,” Bap­tiste added.

By be­com­ing a sig­na­to­ry of the UN Prin­ci­ples of Bank­ing, the Re­pub­lic Group is fur­ther com­mit­ting to mak­ing a pos­i­tive dif­fer­ence in the com­mu­ni­ties and coun­tries in which it op­er­ates, the bank said.

The Unit­ed Na­tions En­vi­ron­ment Pro­gramme Fi­nance Ini­tia­tive (UN­EP FI) is a part­ner­ship be­tween UN­EP and the glob­al fi­nan­cial sec­tor to mo­bilise pri­vate sec­tor fi­nance for sus­tain­able de­vel­op­ment. UN­EP FI works with more than 300 mem­bers—banks, in­sur­ers, and in­vestors—and over 100 sup­port­ing in­sti­tu­tions—to help cre­ate a fi­nan­cial sec­tor that serves peo­ple and plan­et while de­liv­er­ing pos­i­tive im­pacts. It aims to in­spire, in­form and en­able fi­nan­cial in­sti­tu­tions to im­prove peo­ple’s qual­i­ty of life with­out com­pro­mis­ing that of fu­ture gen­er­a­tions.


Related articles

Sponsored

Weather

PORT OF SPAIN WEATHER

Sponsored