3 minute read
ENVIRONMENT
from CSI November 2021
ENVIRONMENT PIONEERING CONSERVATION INTERVENTIONS
Common dolphins in Algoa Bay.
As the WWF Nedbank Green Trust celebrates 30 years, MIKE BROWN, chief executive of Nedbank Group and deputy chair of Business Leadership South Africa, shares why conserving the environment is a key focus of the bank
In 1990, when few companies were talking green and sustainability was not yet a global priority, Nedbank recognised the signs of a looming natural resource crisis. Realising the need to put corporate clout and capital behind sustainable development in South Africa, Nedbank started engaging with WWF-SA (The World Wide Fund for Nature). This led to the creation of the WWF Nedbank Green Trust, based on the principle that business, government and communities need to come together to accelerate environmental conservation and sustainability in South Africa.
The trust is funded through the Nedbank Green Affinity, which has raised more than R350-million for over 200 community-based conservation projects, including climate, energy, freshwater, land, food security, wildlife, oceans and environmental leadership. The projects define a world that respects all people and natural resources to help build a better future for all.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the WWF Nedbank Green Trust funded vegetable garden projects and a major food redistribution project that recovers surplus food from farmers, manufacturers and retailers to distribute to vulnerable people throughout South Africa. This is vital in a country where 10 million tonnes of food – one-third of the 31 million tonnes produced in South Africa annually – go to waste and end up in landfills every year. Meanwhile, a quarter of our population goes hungry every day, with another quarter at risk.
PIONEERING AND PURPOSE-LED PROJECTS
The WWF Nedbank Green Trust has pioneered breakthroughs and achievements at a policy level, such as having South Africa’s strategic water source areas written into legislation.
One of our long-term conservation partnerships focuses on prioritising water security, reducing land degradation through conservation grazing and improving livestock farming opportunities for rural communities, with a project in the Matatiele district of Eastern Cape. This region is home to the Umzimvubu Catchment, the third-largest river system in Southern Africa and a strategic water source area. The project builds on the successes of the Matatiele-based organisation, Environmental Rural Solutions, and has seen the creation of more than 600 jobs in the area, increased incomes in over 1 100 households, alien vegetation clearing on 1 500 hectares of land and the associated replenishment of 1.9 billion litres of water in the system.
Other initiatives include our partnership with the South African National Biodiversity Institute in the development of South Africa’s network of marine protected areas, and the national environmental stewardship programme, initiated through the Enkangala Grassland Programme and the Biodiversity and Wine Initiative, which has brought private and community landowners into the conservation arena.
Our Environmental Leaders Programme has, over the years, developed a pipeline of environmental postgraduates who go on to
FAST FACT
All the projects initiated by the WWF Nedbank Green Trust can be explored in a book published to celebrate the trust’s 30 years of existence. Source: https://www.greentrust.org. za/2021/06/11/celebrating-30-yearsof-conservation/.
Paternoster crayfishers rowing the waves.
take up influential positions in all sectors as environmental and biodiversity sustainability is now mainstreamed within the economy, locally and globally.
As a purpose-led business, we are proud to play both a lending and an advocacy role in matters of sustainable development. We believe that the imperative to deliver a more prosperous society and the threat of climate change will lead to a fundamental reshaping of finance.
Nedbank embraces the Sustainable Development Goals and endorses the objectives of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Paris Agreement, which guide our strategic direction. This era’s agenda is the call for massive change in a short time across the energy and transportation sectors, food systems and built environments. As a bank, we are encouraged to see our clients actively responding to this agenda and needing investment from us to do so. The WWF Nedbank Green Trust’s slogan, “igniting new ways for people and nature to thrive”, has never been more imperative than it is today.
