The Uganda Institute of Banking and Financial Services (UIBFS) has told financial institutions that green financing is the future if the world is to deal with climate change and its effects.

“Green financing is the way to go. All of businesses produce a lot of carbon during their operations and these emissions are causing global warming which is causing climate change. Companies should get green finance to do green water harvesting so that the water that would have affected is used in drought season. They can also work on irrigation systems. We need different models of financing to ensure we invest in initiatives to enable us transition from carbon emitting to a carbon neutral world,” said UIBFS CEO Goretti Masadde.

She was speaking during the Green Finance Awards which  recognize and support women or youth led organizations that have taken significant steps towards managing Climate change either through mitigation, adaptation or biodiversity conservation.

Masadde said there is no shortcut to green financing.

“Sustainability is no longer only about ways of making profit but the needs of the present are met without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs. Through these businesses ensure that natural resources and the environment are neither depleted nor compromised respectively while at the same time adopting practices that help them avoid or overcome the growing effects of climate change.”

She said financial institutions have a great role to play in the green financing  agenda to ensure the world succeeds in its “2050 net zero agenda

“Green Finance is increasingly becoming important globally, as it enables entities to transition their operations to have a positive environmental outcome particularly through becoming carbon neutral.”

Mona Muguma Ssebuliba, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) at aBi Finance Limited said they are working with financial institutions and encouraging them to tap into their facility around green finance to support businesses and farmers be resilient and adapt to climate change.

“We support financial institutions to develop relevant products that smallholder farmers and agribusiness owners can walk in and get financing to enable them get more resilient to climate change. For example we want them to give out loans to support farmers get mulching products , irrigation equipment, improved input and seeds to ensure that they mitigate and reduce effect of climate change on agriculture,”Muguma said.

“By ensuring agriculture sector is resilient, we ensure we are food secure. What is happening with prolonged droughts, floods, pests and diseases is that we are not harvesting as we want or anticipate to. If this happens, we will become food insecure.”

The awards

According to UIBFS CEO Goretti Masadde, the awards  saw a number of individuals and business participate and through a rigorous exercise of due diligence and site visits, 11 finalists were selected to compete for the grand prize of shs5 million.

Out of the 11 finalist, six winners each  walked away with shs5 million to scale their businesses.

The eligibility criteria for the competition was businesses and individuals that demonstrated innovativeness, good governance, social and community impact, woman/ women or youth owned, good financial management and active bank account and environmentally friendly or responsive enterprises.