Sustainable Finance
Protocol

Banco CMF is a Founding Partner of the Sustainable Finance Protocol

Since its creation in 2019, the Sustainable Finance Protocol has succeeded in expanding and consolidating cooperation on environmental and social issues. It started with 18 founding entities, with Banco CMF taking the initial steps alongside them, and has grown to include 33 current members, collectively representing over 94% of the credit granted in the country. The signatories work with the joint goal of promoting a unified sustainability strategy in the Argentine banking system.

With the support of BID Invest (the private arm of the Inter-American Development Bank) and the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) member Fundación Vida Silvestre Argentina, the initiative was established as a framework agreement on four strategic pillars:

  1. i) developing internal policies to implement sustainability strategies;
  2. ii) creating financial products and services to support projects with positive environmental and social impact financing;
  3. iii) optimizing current risk analysis systems with an environmental and social focus; and
  4. iv) promoting a culture of sustainability.

The signatory banks, through their participation in various working groups, aim to disseminate and promote best practices among Argentine financial institutions. They have progressed in creating documents for different thematic areas, including a Guide for the Development of a Sustainability Policy, SARAS Guide (Environmental and Social Risk Management System), a guide for Climate Change Adaptation, a Taxonomy for Women-Led SMEs, and a Guide of recommendations on gender perspective in the financial industry.

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Even in this challenging context, both locally and globally, the signing banks are taking actions towards incorporating the evaluation of environmental and social risks into traditional credit analysis, seeking to mitigate socio-environmental impact for more sustainable development. Additionally, Protocol members have addressed the issues of inclusion and diversity with a gender focus, as a first step towards reducing existing gaps in financing and empowering women. This effort aims to unify definitions and metrics to work on improvements in both the granting of financing and internal policies within each institution. Progress has also been made in proposing financial products that promote sustainable development, trying not to sacrifice profitability.

Over these four years, the Sustainable Finance Protocol has facilitated the identification of specialists, the training of various teams from member banks, and collaboration between state and private entities, both national and international. It has laid the groundwork for cross-cutting policies in all areas of the banks’ specialization. The exchange and joint work initiated by the Protocol will mean a profound change in the Argentine banking system.

With the conviction that the future of sustainability must be a commitment of the entire society, the signing banks hope to gather new adherents so that the transformative capacity inherent in credit providers can contribute to the sustainable development of the country.

Founding Banks: Banco de la Nación Argentina, Banco Galicia, Banco Ciudad, Banco BICE, Banco CMF, Banco Supervielle, Banco Santander, Banco Provincia de Buenos Aires, BBVA Argentina, Banco Macro, HSBC Argentina, Banco Patagonia, Itaú Argentina, Banco Comafi, Banco Industrial, Banco Mariva, Banco de Tierra del Fuego, BST.

Adherent Banks: Banco Hipotecario, Banco Formosa, Bancor.

Honorary Witnesses: ADEBA, ABA, ABAPPRA.

Promoting Entities: BID Invest, Fundación Vida Silvestre Argentina.