Banca Generali brings sustainability to school

Raise awareness, popularize and open a debate among the younger generation. Because challenges are also won at school. It is with these goals that Banca Generali has kicked off its "sustainability tour," a project that started in Naples and will involve about 3,500 students from 15 high schools throughout Italy. The educational tour, held by the private bank's experts thanks to an agreement with Centro Elis, will wind its way along the Boot in the third, fourth and fifth classes of schools in Piedmont, Veneto, Tuscany and other Italian regions to close in Calabria, in Cosenza.

The bank's journey into Esg issues is part of the broader context of the BG4SDG'S project carried out in tandem with renowned photographer Stefano Guindani (a photo reportage, a docufilm by Emanuele Imbucci, traveling exhibitions, a book...all with a green background), which aimed to raise awareness of the United Nations Sustainable Goals and to highlight the criticalities of certain environmental targets, as well as the opportunities thanks to innovation and human abilities to overcome the obstacles.

One brick after another now sustainability issues will also reach students' desks thanks to 'an agreement signed with Elis, a company dedicated to training young people to work, which promotes development and innovation in collaboration with training institutions, companies, universities, research centers and institutions.

The initiative has been given the imprimatur of the Ministry of Education and Merit (MIM) with the recognition to students of the Pathways for Transversal Skills and Orientation (PCTO) hours. And it will see the Head of Sustainability's team, Elena Leonardi, and Enzo Ruini, strategic sales manager on sustainability, take the stage with the aim of delving into these and other topics. The meetings with Banca Generali experts will aim to bring mature students their testimony of the impact of the #BG4SDGs project, presenting the actions and results achieved.

 

Why bring a seemingly technical, complex and such an up-and-coming topic to teenagers? "Because sustainability is becoming a central issue on the agendas of the most developed nations and major world institutions as evidenced by the decisions made by the United Nations Climate Change Conference concluded less than two months ago in Dubai. And before being a think tank topic, it is first and foremost a way of life and behavior," Leonardi comments. "This is why the bank has decided to make it the subject of training and also why it is strengthening its green commitment, which has seen its goals and ambitions gradually grow by broadening the scope of intervention."

Some numbers. Halfway through the 2022-2024 business plan, the entity led by CEO Gian Maria Mossa showed growth from 6.5 billion in Esg assets at the end of 2021 (accounting for 14.6 percent of managed solutions) to 14.1 billion at the end of the first half of 2023, accounting for 33.7 percent of total managed assets. By the end of 2024, the target of 40 percent of ESG products (funds and wrappers) out of total total managed solutions is confirmed."

The three-year goal aimed at increasing people's training and engagement toward ESG issues sees the bank in full swing having already involved 71 percent of its employees in dedicated training activities (target 70 percent by 2024) with 30 percent of the network already mastering in-depth ESG knowledge (target 50 percent).

The bank's commitment to transparency in governance and engagement with stakeholders," the manager recalls, "has seen increased ratings from the main agencies in charge on industry best practice levels (Msci score A from BBB in 2022, Standard Ethics EE+ at the highest in Italy, Moodys 62/100), where we note the review from Morningstar's ESG rating agency - Sustainalytics - which recently further improved the rating to 7.8 points "Negligible Risk," confirming BG's positioning that for two years now remains the first in Asset Manager & Custody Services out of about 400 global players.