Industrial Bank – Zhenzhen Xia – 2022

Goals

As China’s first equatorial bank, and a member of the Green Finance Committee of the China Society for Finance and Banking, CIB Research has been working on green finance for over 10 years. Blue finance is part of the green finance system, and Climate Corps fellow Zhenzhen Xia’s main tasks were to sort out the blue finance-related background, policies, standards, products, and international and domestic practices, and analyze the current problems in the development of blue finance, with a view to providing guidance and suggestions for clients to develop blue finance and contribute to sustainable development.

Solutions

Given the ongoing research and existing business model of CIB Research, the most influential approach is to study, analyze and provide recommendations for sustainable ocean development, promote the construction of a standard framework for blue finance in China, and provide the necessary financial services for the implementation of corporate blue financing projects. The work can be divided into three phases:

1. Identifying key considerations by studying the current status, future trends and best practices, incorporating the investment and financing demands of key stakeholders, and examining the framework structure of existing practices. This phase is critical as it allows Zhenzhen Xia to gain a deeper understanding and appreciation of the emerging field of blue finance, examine past and present blue economy and blue finance developments, and identify existing development problems and potential barriers
2. Analyzed and synthesized the learning outcomes from the previous phase, formulated final recommendations, and outlined the next steps
3. Provided professional support and business guidance to CIB Research’s clients based on the research findings 

Potential Impact

The work done by Zhenzhen Xia during the EDF CC project will provide guidance for CIB Research’s blue finance practices, and give full play to the leverage of financial institutions to channel more capital to sustainable ocean development. This will also help alleviate the financing difficulties in the blue economy projects of ocean-related enterprises, and promote their transition towards sustainable development.