Representatives from the National Bank of Cambodia (NBC), the Association of Banks in Cambodia (ABC), and US based Moody’s Corporation on May 28th, 2021, discussed future collaboration and partnership on sustainable finances in Cambodia.
Moody’s Corporation is an American financial services company that acts as the holding company for Moody’s Investors Service and Moody’s Analytics. Moody’s Investors Service provides investors with credit ratings, risk analysis, and research for stocks, bonds, and government entities.
The meeting led by Mr. Heng Bomakara, Deputy Director General of Banking Supervision at the National Bank of Cambodia (NBC), joined with Mr. Heng Koy, General Manager of the Association of Banks in Cambodia, Mr. James Flitton, Moody’s Relationship Management Team for Southeast Asia and the senior management team of the three institutions as well as the relevant stakeholders, who are involved on sustainable finance.
The meeting aimed at exploring opportunity on how Moody and ABC can collaborate on sustainable finance, and what the ABC can do more in the sustainable finance. The discussion was also touched upon the upcoming of Moody’s workshop/seminar on Environmental, Social, and Corporate Governance (ESG) /Sustainable Finance.
Mr. Heng Koy, General Manager of the Association of Banks in Cambodia, gave the brief presentation on the overview on how the association of banks is working towards the Cambodian sustainable finance initiative, and the establishment and execution of the proper Environmental and Social Risk Management. He also presented the roadmap on sustainable finance of the association of Banks, which is focused on the regional & international Cooperation, capability building, public awareness & social Activates, and development of voluntary reporting template and KPIs.
Mr. Heng Bomakara, Director General of Banking Supervision, at the National Bank of Cambodia (NBC), said that the sustainable practices have been increased in the financial sector on the national and international level.
“Sustainable finance has not been focused on only in Cambodia, but also in the G20 as well as IMF. Today is the first step that Cambodia involve and participate in sustainability as ABC has developed the sustainable committee for quite some time, but for this meeting, we will learn more how to make the sustainability more successful from Moody.” Bomakara added.
James Flitton, appreciated the comprehensive presentation of ABC’s. He said it seems the association of banks and member banks are very active in terms of anything to do with the sustainable finance.It cannot begin with only the individual FIs, but everyone needs to be involved in the process in order to succeed. Again, sustainable finance has been the hot topic for the moment. It is somethings that presents obviously the challenges also opportunities.
Heng Koy, GM of ABC said that it is an opportunity for the ABC and Member Banks. He said the next road map is on capacity building and also on a number of tools to monitor the principles and guidelines that we develop for ESG.
“The initiative of the association is new and as Moody highlights, Moody has full resources and tools which have been developed, we will explore further on this. We will have a further discussion on that. We are also interested in webinars,” Mr Koy added.
At the end of the remark, Mr Bomakara said that everyone has to understand why sustainable finance is important for them. It is not only for banking sector, but for the economy as a whole. Even the people outside the banking sector need to understand the sustainability of the industry.
While, Mr. James appreciated the ABC and NBC on the fruitful discussion and looks forward for further collaboration with ABC and other stakeholders.
