Chinese Central Bank Commits to Combating Climate Change, Calls for Further Improvements to Green Finance Standards

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A senior official from the Chinese central bank has called for further improvements to the system of standards governing green finance in China.

Xuan Changneng (宣昌能), deputy-governor of the People’s Bank of China (PBOC), said that the central bank will “continue to effectively perform key work for finance to support green and low-carbon transformation,” in accordance with the directives of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the State Council.

Xuan made the remarks on 13 November at the 2022 annual meeting of the Green Finance Specialist Committee of the China Society for Finance and Banking (中国金融学会).

“Given the complexity and variability of domestic and overseas conditions at present, and the background of the manifold challenges faced by the whole world dealing with climate change, the broad trend of the whole world adapting to and resolving climate change will not shift,” Xuan said.

Xuan highlighted four key points for further driving green finance in China:

  1. Improving green finance standards, and significantly raising carbon accounting and environmental information disclosure standards.
  2. Further improving the green finance standardisation system, and driving integration with overseas standards.
  3. Accelerating research and development of [business] transformation finance standards, and expediting the effective integration of transformation finance with green finance.
  4. Exploring and developing carbon accounting methods for that are in consonance with China’s national circumstances, and researching and advancing unified guidelines for environmental information disclosures by financial institutions.