How to nudge sustainability through financing

Bpost, Belgium's leading postal operator, shows how banks can incentivise firms to reduce their carbon footprints and realise their sustainability goals.

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The increasing corporate focus on the challenges and opportunities of sustainable growth has been a positive development. Many companies – and their stakeholders, investors and banking partners – are nonetheless still only at the initial stages of exploring how to incentivise and embed sustainable behaviours.  

Bpost, Belgium’s leading postal operator, is pioneering a novel approach in working with financing partners and data specialists to help realise its sustainability ambitions. A €300 million sustainability loan in October 2017 provided that incentive: by varying the margin it pays to the lender depending on an independently evaluated annual sustainability score, it has a positive incentive to reduce its carbon footprint – and satisfy the sustainability goals of its stakeholders and investors.

Thibault d’Ursel, Bpost’s Head of CSR, Energy and Environment explains: “The more initiatives we take, the better the interest rate will be. And that is for me an important and interesting lever to push our initiatives within the company.”