Cho Yong-byoung, chairman of Shinhan Financial Group, set up and is running a group-wide environmental, social, and governance (ESG) study group.
The study group has 10 members from all group affiliates, mostly working-level officials. In the future, the organization will play its roles as an ESG think tank in charge of Shinhan Financial Group’s ESG strategy and implementation.
Shinhan Financial Group recently set up the Shinhan ESG Study Group, according to industry sources on Feb. 27.
Its members are 10 working-level officials from Shinhan Bank, Shinhan Financial Investment, and Shin Card and Chairman Cho.
Employees of ESG Global Desk’s London branch will also participate in the study group. ESG Global Desk’s London branch was newly established in 2022.
In the future, the Shinhan ESG Study Group will play a role in sharing ESG-related domestic and international trends, major current ESG issues at the Shinhan Financial Group and its affiliates, and exploring new ESG agendas at the group level. It will also give lectures by invited experts.
At the first study meeting held on March 22, they had a discussion about research on financial carbon emissions. In particular, they discussed how to reduce carbon emissions from Shinhan Financial Group’s assets.
A cover image of ESG report “FINANCE for IMPACT” published by Shinhan Financial Group.
Shinhan Financial Group has ESG bodies at all of its affiliates. Chairman Cho judged that it was time to accelerate ESG management. Members of the study group are ESG department heads with work expertise in authority.
Cho set up the ESG Study Group because he believed that ESG management was a matter of survival. The group chairman usually compared ESG to a “corporate vaccine.”
“ESG is like a vaccine for companies gearing up for an uncertain business environment,” Cho said at an ESG Promotion Committee meeting last year.
“Let’s speed up ESG implementation by discovering and developing Shinhan’s differentiated ESG business models beyond pondering ESG and declaring ESG management.”
Shinhan Financial Group already established the ESG Strategy Committee which manages and supervises ESG issues in its Board of Directors for the first time in Korea in 2015 and has combined ESG with its business strategy sector since 2018.
Since 2019, 17 group affiliates have designated their chief strategy and sustainability officers (CSSOs) and ESG working-level officials to operate the group’s council.
In 2021, the ESG Promotion Committee with the CEOs of all group subsidiaries was established to complete a driving system for ESG management.
Earlier this year, Green IB Promotion Lab and ESG Global Desk for ESG-related investment were newly established.
In the meantime, Shinhan Financial Group plans to deliver one billion won in donations to the National Disaster Relief Association to support relief activities and damage recovery for residents affected by large forest fires that broke out on the east coast on March 4.
Each affiliate of Shinhan Financial Group plans to provide various support to help residents hit hard by the forest fires.
Shinhan Bank will provide emergency livelihood stabilization funds of up to 50 million won per individual to residents affected by the forest fires, and provide operating funds of up to 500 million won per company to small and medium-sized enterprises and partners of affected companies.
It also plans to provide financial support, such as a grace period for repayment of loans, an extension of maturity, and a loan interest reduction of up to 1.0 percentage points.
Meanwhile, Shinhan Bank’s Gangwon headquarters is conducting relief activities such as delivering free meals and laundry services for first responders and victims.
Shinhan Card plans to provide financial support for customers affected by forest fires. Shinhan Life will then suspend the payment of insurance premiums for customers affected by the forest fires for the next six months.
