FC4S in Asia – Shenzhen and the Real Economy Lab

With 8 members in Asia, in 2019 the FC4S Asia node successfully focused on supporting the establishment of the Real Economy Lab. Launched in October 2019 during the FC4S AGM, this important effort has been led by the Shenzhen Green Finance Committee (SZ-GFC), a regional pioneer in green finance.

Established with the support of the Shenzhen Municipal Government and the People’s Bank of China, Shenzhen Central Branch, as the world’s first financial service platform linking green finance and green real economy, the work of the Lab is focused on four elements of activities.

The first element works to explore new real economy models of green financial services and identify the green industries that could benefit from green finance and design commercially sustainable and operable new green finance models. Secondly, the Lab seeks to assist financial institutions formulate innovative financial solutions, expand financing channels, explore sustainable green financial business models, enrich green financial service chains, and promote green capital to serve green industries and enterprises in a faster, more stable and extensive way. Thirdly, the Lab is also focused on establishing a pool of green technologies, projects and enterprises and identify green projects in FC4S member cities to be integrated into a green technology project library jointly established by the Shenzhen Green Financial Committee and the China Emissions Exchange. Finally, the Lab is developing an international information exchange network of green finances, conduct international exchange activities and promote the experience and technical exchanges between Lab members and other financial centres.

At a local level, SZ-GFC is also developing local green finance standards which are covered by the Chinese national standards system. They are also working with different government agencies, such as Environmental Protection Bureau, Housing and Construction Bureau, to target specific green sectors with green finance products and services. Shenzhen has also been active at the international level, including developing the China green fund standard for the Bank of China, and presenting policy studies on green private equity funds on behalf of China to the G20 in 2018.