Nine local banks, FIs join ESROM

FE Team | Published: March 10, 2018 21:48:04

FE Desk
Phase 2 of Environmental and Social Risk and Opportunity Management (ESROM) has reached out to a greater scope and partnered up with nine local banking and financial institutions, said a statement.
The institutions are BRAC Bank Limited, Dutch-Bangla Bank Limited, The City Bank Limited, Eastern Bank Limited, IDLC Finance Limited, Mutual Trust Bank Limited (MTB), ONE Bank Limited, Prime Bank Limited and United Commercial Bank Limited.
From the development financial institutions' side, FMO in collaboration with DEG, Proparco, OeEB and GCPF have spearheaded the endeavor.
The programmes aim to deliver 8 training sessions from February till April 2018, covering approximately 250 banking officials, especially from the relationship and credit side.
The first two sessions have already taken place in February 2018, where as the remaining ones will be taking place on the following dates; 19 - 20 March 2018 & 21 - 22 March 2018, 9 - 10 April 2018, 11 - 12 April 2018, 23 - 24 April 2018, 25 - 26 April 2018.
This time the program's focus areas are E & S due diligence as per regulatory guideline, critical E & S issues in high risk sectors often highlighted in Environmental and Social Impact Assessment (ESIA), applicability and scope of IFC's Performance Standards. The last two sessions will have participation from clients operating in High risk sectors. This contemporary and first of its kind initiative will help the bankers as well as the entrepreneurs comprehend the true essence of environmental and social safeguards in a much broader manner.
FMO together with four other DFIs (DEG, Proparco, OeEB and UNEP FI) along with local banking partners-BRAC Bank Limited, Eastern Bank Limited, Dutch-Bangla Bank Limited, IDLC Finance Limited and the City Bank Limited-- piloted the first Environmental and Social Risk and Opportunity Management (ESROM) training series project in 2015 where a total of 150 bankers were trained in the course of six training sessions on solid E&S risk and opportunities management, said the statement.
Encouraged by the tremendous success of ESROM-1 as well as steered by the Guidelines on Environmental & Social Risk Management (ESRM) in February 2017 issued by Bangladesh Bank, similar initiative has been undertaken yet again this year to further build the knowledge base of the bankers and enlighten them with new areas of E & S risk management.