On May 10, PBOC, MEE, NFRA, and CSRC jointly held a meeting on developing green finance to support the Beautiful China Initiative. The meeting studied the general plan made by the CPC Central Committee and the State Council on advancing the Beautiful China Initiative in all respects, shared practices on providing financial support for green, low-carbon development and the Beautiful China Initiative, and mapped out the work plan for the coming period. Pan Gongsheng, PBOC Governor, Huang Runqiu, MEE Minister, Fu Wanjun, NFRA Vice Minister, and Wang Jianjun, CSRC Vice Chairman, attended and addressed the meeting, which was chaired by Zhu Hexin, PBOC Deputy Governor.
As noted at the meeting, the Beautiful China Initiative has been launched by the CPC Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core, as a major strategic arrangement based on overall considerations for China’s socialist modernization development. At the National Conference on Ecological and Environmental Protection, General Secretary Xi Jinping underscored the importance of “Stepping up financial support and developing green finance with vigorous effort”, which stands as the fundamental guideline and action guide for developing green finance to support the Beautiful China Initiative. Therefore, taking effective steps to develop green finance is naturally called for in the implementation of the relevant decisions and arrangements made by the CPC Central Committee to meet the needs of the Beautiful China Initiative. It plays an important role in supporting the green transformation of the real economy, helping achieve high-quality financial development, and tackling the risks posed by climate change.
As held at the meeting, institutional innovations pursued by ecology and environment authorities in recent years regarding climate investment and financing, carbon market development, and the ecology-oriented development (EOD) model have created conditions for financial institutions to engage in efforts aimed at addressing climate change and protecting and restoring ecosystems. Through continued explorations, the financial sector has made achievements in areas of green finance, such as the establishment of a standards system, information disclosure, incentives and constraints, product and service innovation, and international cooperation, which have laid foundations for developing green finance to serve the needs of the Beautiful China Initiative.
The meeting stressed that leveraging the role of green finance to support the Beautiful China Initiative is a duty and responsibility of both the financial system and the system of ecology and environment. Financial regulators, ecology and environment authorities, financial institutions, and the concerned enterprises should intensify cross-department and cross-sector cooperation, adopt coordinated approaches, and further enhance top-level design. They should push ahead with the development of environmental factor markets, move in a phased manner to incorporate more industries into the coverage of China’s carbon market, and improve the national trading market for voluntary reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. Tapping into the professional advantages of the relevant agencies and institutions in the ecology and environment sector, they should strengthen technical support for carbon accounting as well as third-party assessment and certification. Moreover, financial institutions and financial infrastructures should better play their roles and render further support for the development of the carbon market. The government-bank-enterprise connections should be improved to facilitate financing, while a joint promotion mechanism should be set up to support the key projects of the Beautiful China Initiative.
It was also stressed that in planning their general strategies, financial institutions should fully take into account their adaptability to green economic and social transformation, incorporate climate risks into their overall risk management, and become better adaptive to meet the needs of economic and social transformation. To suit the development of green finance, they should improve organizational building, strengthen assessment and incentives, and improve professional abilities to provide financial services. Financial institutions should also step up work on green financial products and services, broaden repayment and guaranty options for relevant projects, and explore innovative products such as environmental equity-secured loans, environmental benefit-linked loans, and securitization of green credit assets. Concrete efforts should be made to increase the precision of green financial investments, to improve information disclosure and carbon accounting, and to guard against “Greenwashing” and “Transition-washing”. While continuously beefing up financial support for energy conservation, carbon reduction as well as ecological and environmental protection, they should ensure reasonable support for the low-carbon transformation of high-carbon industries such as coal-fired power. Financial regulatory agencies will work with the MEE to further improve policy arrangements, establish a routine mechanism for project recommendation, strengthen monitoring, assessment and policy coordination, and enhance publicity efforts, so that substantive progress will be achieved in the provision of green financial services to support the Beautiful China Initiative.
Representatives from CHN Energy, China Three Gorges Corporation, and the MEE Policy Research Center for Environment and Economy briefed the meeting on the demand for green finance and their relevant work. Representatives from China Development Bank, Industrial Bank, and Industrial Securities shared their work experience in green finance.
Attendees included officials from relevant departments of the PBOC, MEE, NFRA, and CSRC, and representatives from development banks, policy banks, large state-owned commercial banks, some joint-stock banks, securities companies, fund companies, and some key institutions and enterprises in the ecology and environment sector. Attending the meeting remotely were officials from PBOC branches and ecology and environment agencies of provinces, municipalities, autonomous regions, and cities specifically designated in the state plan.
Source: PBOC
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