Miljöhänseende vid kreditgivning
en fallstudie av Swedbank
Background: Last year (2006) has been a year when the environmental issues figured more often in the media, and the environmental awareness among common people increased. Environmental climate reports have lately been on the headline all over the world. As a result of the increasing population in the world, it?s becoming more important to be aware of the environment. To do that, it is important to maximize the efficiency in the work with the environment. During the last couple of years, banks and other credit institutions have been working with a greater awareness of the environmental issues. These banks and credit institutions have a big influence on the society which leads to a greater influence on the environment. Lending is the most important way for the banks to influence the environment. But banks and credit institutions can also make economic benefits by having an environmental policy.
Purpose: The purpose with this essay is to study if the employees, who work with credit rating, sees the environment as a risk when they do their credit analyses. With this essay, the writer also tries to find out how well the communication system at Swedbank works and how the communication can be improved.
Method: This essay is a case study of Swedbank. Five credit raters of different sex and different age have been interviewed. The interviews have been made at two branch offices, one small at the countryside and one bigger in a city.
Results: The results from this study have shown that the employees have some environmental awareness but they need to get more extensive knowledge of environmental risks that can occur. The communication at the bank works in a certain extent, but if the credit rators shall get a greater environmental awareness, Swedbank must improve their education for the credit rators.