09/11/21

SINGAPORE: Consortium of Banks to Digitalise Green Trade Finance.

As published on finews.asia, Tuesday 9 November, 2021.

The initiative aims to enable effective, data-driven decision-making around environmental, social and governance (ESG) factors so that banks can better support their clients’ green trade financing needs.

Singapore aims to grow its role as a leading green trade finance hub regionally and globally, and will develop digital solutions for the application of green trade financing standards under a pilot with Singapore Trade Data Exchange (SGTraDex) and a UOB-led consortium that also includes DBS, OCBC Bank and Standard Chartered, according to an announcement on Tuesday.

The pilot, set to be rolled out in November 2021 with key industries such as agriculture, real estate and construction, aims to facilitate a more seamless and trusted ESG data exchange between financial institutions and the projects they are financing in the real economic sectors.

According to SGTraDex, the green trade financing data exchange model will enable simplified and faster green trade financing to qualified supply chain players and build capabilities for the banking industry to make trade-based green financing more readily available and accessible in the market.

«This initiative will enable empirical decision-making around green and sustainability-linked trade financing which is crucial to bolstering Singapore’s role as a green trade finance hub,» Antoine Cadoux, CEO, SGTraDex, said.