BAKU, Azerbaijan, November 14. The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) has introduced its new Environmental and Social Policy (ESP 2024). The policy reinforces the bank’s commitment to ensuring all its investments meet the highest environmental and social standards.
In an exclusive interview with Trend, Maya Hennerkes, Managing Director of the Environment and Sustainability Department at the EBRD, described this period as a crucial moment for advancing environmental and social goals. "It’s an extremely important and exciting time to work on environmental and social matters. I think it’s probably never been more important," she said.
"Every single euro, every single dollar that goes out of our doors is checked against the requirements of our environmental and social policy. We really want to make sure that we have good international practices, project by project, consistently," Hennerkes noted.
Hennerkes emphasized that the new policy applies across EBRD’s expanding geographical scope, covering countries from Azerbaijan to sub-Saharan Africa and Iraq. "That often really means also beyond the project-by-project work that we’re trying to elevate and build capacity. We support policy of governments that have sustainable goals, and we engage very closely locally with stakeholders, with communities," she explained.
She underlined that EBRD’s environmental and social specialists play an active role on the ground. "They spend a lot of time really on site with their rubber boots on their feet and with a PPE protection kit on the body, walking around, engaging with people, learning from people, having dialogue with local village communities, with local authorities, and so on," Hennerkes said.
The ESP 2024 seeks to balance the bank’s strong safeguards with its broader mission to foster green finance and inclusive growth. "When you work on green finance, you see the full circle of how this green transformation needs to go about," the bank's rep said. "We want to make sure that on the impact side, we have ideally no negative impact, or if there are impacts that arise from a project, that we can mitigate those to a satisfactory manner".
She added that financing the transition to greener and more inclusive economies remains central to the EBRD’s work. "We need to make sure that we channel the funding to the right use of proceeds, to the right projects, so that we have a lot of green projects, for example. But these safeguards are always a precondition that we will not negotiate".
Hennerkes noted that the ESP 2024 embodies the EBRD’s continued effort to combine environmental protection, social inclusion, and responsible financing. "Working in this area brings all the pieces together - the impacts, the goal setting, the business opportunities, and the really careful approach to risk mitigation," she added.