Awards for Excellence 2019
Ukrgasbank is one Ukraine’s largest banks, serving 900,000 retail customers in addition to small and medium-sized enterprises and corporates.
It is also an example of sustainability in the region, having set out in 2016 with the IFC to develop green banking in Ukraine. It deservedly wins the award for CEE’s best bank for sustainable finance.
In 2018, the bank financed 60% of all new renewable energy facilities in Ukraine, including the first solar power station in the Chernobyl exclusion zone in 2018. The green projects funded by the bank allow the reduction of carbon emissions of almost a million tonnes a year.
Some 90% of projects in Ukraine in renewables, energy efficiency and environmental protection go through the bank.
Ukraine is the most energy intensive country in the region and indeed the whole of Europe. The country still consumes three times more energy per capita than its European neighbours and recycles only 4% of its waste (as compared to 40% in the EU) – this is largely due to outdated Soviet infrastructure and the urgent need for modernization.