The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) and the People’s Bank of China (PBoC) have teamed up to create a green finance taskforce to help transition to a low-carbon future.
Called the China-Singapore Green Finance Taskforce (GFTF), the two countries plan to collaborate on initiatives to scale up green and transitioning finance. At its inaugural meeting in Chongquing on 21 April, the group focused on three areas aimed at green and transition flows in the region: taxonomies and definitions, products and instruments, and technology.
The two central banks plan to work together under the International Platform on Sustainable Finance (IPSF) to increase their use of taxonomies, as well as further define transition activities in both countries. In addition, the Singapore Exchange and China International Capital Corporation will work together to issue access green and transition bond products. Both countries also plan to leverage technology to facilitate sustainable financing, including digital green bonds with carbon credits.
The taskforce will “deepen” Singapore and China’s “collaboration in green and transition finance”, said Gillian Tan, MAS assistant managing director and chief sustainability officer.
“The GFTF provides a platform for knowledge exchange and will galvanise collaboration between public-private participants from China and Singapore on concrete initiatives that will catalyse capital flows to support a credible and inclusive transition to a low-carbon future for our countries and the region,” she added.
MAS also announced its Finance for Net Zero action plan on 20 April, which will add transition finances to the central bank’s existing green finance plan launched in 2019.
Last year, MAS announced plans to decarbonise its US$300bn reserve fund, while the PBoC provided US$31bn in green finance to banks. However, the PBoC has come under scrutiny for its use of greenwashing and fraudulent practices by Chinese carbon auditing firms.
This page was last updated May 8, 2023
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