Sustainable Business Practices in Banking Sector

The sustainable business practices include incorporating principles of sustainability into each of its business decisions, supplying environment friendly products or services and committing to environmental principles in its business operations. The objective of the study is to examine the role of banking sector in developing the sustainable business practices. The study has been carried out through detailed review of literature and analysis of various research reports on Sustainable business practices. It is found that the Indian banks have realised the need of adopting sustainable business practices, however, they are far behind from their foreign counterparts. The banks need to mainstream sustainability into its core business practices by integrating it into strategy formulation. The banks also need to follow the environmental trends and changes in regulatory framework to assess the possible implications of these changes on their borrowers’ overall financial position. They have to develop new products such as ethical funds or loans specifically designed for environmental businesses to capture new market opportunities associated with sustainability. And lastly, the Sustainability Reporting is the key requirement for giving a thrust to the sustainability efforts of the government.