Position title: Vice President, Financing Green, Asia Sustainable Finance
Reports to: Director, Climate & Sustainability, WWF-Singapore
About WWF-Singapore
World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) is one of the world’s largest and most respected independent conservation organisations. WWF’s mission is to stop the degradation of the earth’s natural environment and to build a future in which humans live in harmony with nature. As one of WWF’s international hubs, WWF-Singapore supports a global network spanning over 100 countries. WWF Singapore works closely with local stakeholders towards a greener and more sustainable Singapore and the region around us. We work to address key conservation areas, such as climate change, sustainable finance, deforestation, illegal wildlife trade, marine conservation, and sustainable production and consumption, through collaboration, education and outreach efforts involving the community, businesses, and governments. For more information, please visit wwf.sg.
I. Mission of the Asia Sustainable Finance Team:
WWF has identified the finance sector as a key driver of global economic activity with which we must engage to successfully deliver on our long-term conservation mission. To do this, we work with key finance sector players including banks, investors, regulators, and stock exchanges, across six focus areas:
1. Regulations and Guidelines: We provide recommendations and facilitate dialogue between regulatory authorities and financial institutions (FIs) to issue harmonized regulations and guidelines that raise the bar for sustainable finance at the national and regional level.
2. Standards: We help FIs understand what makes certain standards and certification schemes credible to help them ensure that their due diligence and verification processes assure robust sustainability practices.
3. Capacity Building: We empower FIs through capacity building on environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues through industry-wide workshops and bilateral training sessions. Our training covers a range of sectors and thematic focus areas and helps FIs to better assess and price risk, value companies, and develop new products.
4. Research & Tools: We conduct research, develop best practice guides, and benchmark FIs’ progress on ESG integration to ensure timely progress towards a resilient and sustainable financial system. We also help FIs to understand and implement cutting-edge tools so they can better understand, measure, and manage evolving ESG risks and opportunities.
5. Engagement: We help investors exert their influence and facilitate large scale, meaningful change by providing research and analysis that supports their engagement with portfolio companies over key ESG issues.
6. Green Financial Solutions: We work with FIs to support the development of innovative green financial and channel financing to nature based solutions based on science-based criteria that create measurable environmental and social impacts alongside competitive financial returns.
In Asia, we work across seven (6) ASEAN countries - Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam – as well as in Japan and South Korea. We focus on sustainability issues related to soft commodities finance (e.g. agriculture, forestry, and seafood), the energy and infrastructure sectors, and crosscutting issues such as climate and nature.
III. Major Duties and Responsibilities:
The VP will contribute to the general work of the team work under the direction of senior team members across the following areas, part of the responsible investment team:
Accelerate financing for nature-based projects across Asia
• Develop strategy for financing nature-based projects in Asia in collaboration with WWF country offices and finance practice
• Work with projects in Asia to structure project plans to meet requirements of donors / financiers
• Develop relationships with funds and philanthropic organisations in Singapore that invest in nature-based projects to widen potential funding sources for projects
• Conduct research on emerging green and blue financial solutions to support the development and structuring of innovative financial solutions to mobilize additional capital to protect and restore nature and communities
Stakeholder engagement and relationship management
• Manage relationships with key finance sector stakeholders, including investors (asset owners, asset managers), regulators, government ministries, etc.
• Manage relationships with conservation project leads across WWF Asian countries to develop a pipeline of bankable projects
• Work closely with other WWF national offices in the region to co-execute country-specific finance sector engagement strategies, taking into account the varying interests and priorities of different finance sector stakeholders, including investors (asset owners, asset managers), stock exchanges, regulators, government ministries, etc.
ESG research and tools
• Conduct research on topics including ESG trends, analysis of financial institutions’ performance on ESG integration/risk management and corporate sustainability disclosure and performance
• Contribute to the development of reports and tools to support capacity building, policy development and investor collective engagement
Communications
• Represent WWF perspectives, present WWF research and tools, and demonstrate thought leadership on sustainable finance at regional/domestic conferences and other events
• Manage the communication of research findings and WWF positions to finance sector stakeholders through multiple channels, e.g. press releases for mainstream/trade media, op-eds/blogs, interviews, social media, etc.
• Manage communications with other WWF national offices and other relevant internal stakeholders to identify and address potential conflicts in objectives and interests
Training and capacity building
• Develop and leverage technical expertise to support the organization and content development for capacity building workshops, webinars and other events targeted at finance sector stakeholders (asset managers and private banks in particular) on sustainable finance and ESG issues/trends, including climate and nature themes
• Work with WWF conservation, commodity, climate and water experts to distil insights and knowledge into guidance and recommendations for the finance sector
• Build capacity of wider WWF network on sustainable finance and ensure understanding of its contribution to their respective interests and priorities
Fundraising, budgeting, and reporting
• Contribute to writing funding proposals to secure long-term funding for both the Singapore sustainable finance team and regional offices
• Assist in monitoring, evaluating, budgeting and reporting of project performance against planned objectives and deliverables and milestones
Required Skills and Competencies
• 5+ years of experience in sustainable finance or related field, preferably with experience in financing of nature based solutions
• Able to prioritize, work in a dynamic environment and operate under tight deadlines
• Ability to work independently and proactively;
• Excellent oral and written communication skills;
• Adherence to WWF’s values, which are: Courage, Integrity, Respect and Collaboration
Must be able to travel internationally (approx. 15%)
This job description covers the main tasks. Other tasks may be assigned as necessary according to organisational needs.
