16 Our sustainability strategy As an internationally active banking group, we are faced with specific challenges in our efforts to realize our sustainability vision. These arise from the economic, social and environmental impacts of our business activities as well as from the external conditions within which we operate. We work within a global environment that is characterized by numerous economic, geopolitical and environmental risks. The financial services sector itself has for years been confronted with many challenges and risks. In order to remain profitable over the long term, these challenges call for a strong culture of risk management and sustainability. Alongside classic banking risks, the stability of the financial system and reputation risks, topics such as corruption, money-laundering and Responsible banker Environment Product ecology Society Social product responsibility Economy Added value We create sustainable Sustainable entrepreneurship Active civil society and public interest Environmentally friendly society Engaged citizen Fair business and operating practices Stakeholder inclusion Inhouse ecology Fair partner value Our approach as designers of a sustainable company and society high-risk sectors also come into play here. These include, for example, CO2-intensive fields such as oil, gas and energy (e.g. shale gas), nuclear energy, the arms industry (e.g. weapons and cluster munitions), agricultural‚ production of raw materials and food (e.g. palm oil, food speculation). Dealing appropriately with risks is part of our business model. As a banking group, we hold ourselves to corresponding standards of sustainability amidst all these circumstances, just as our stakeholders expect of us: • We are committed to legal as well as ethical standards and must ensure that these standards are met. • As a consequence of the financial crisis, the financial services industry suffered a loss of trust. Since then, banks have been under closer watch by their stakeholders and find themselves subject to more stringent regulatory requirements. We therefore work to make our business sustainable and wish to create sustainable value for our stakeholders. • Our operational business activities are connected with environmental impacts that we strive to keep as low as possible by means of systematic environmental management. • As an employer, we are responsible for ensuring safe and attractive working conditions for our employees. • As a member of society, we want to contribute to the common good beyond our business activities and take action in line with our capabilities. In order to live up to these requirements as well as to improve the effectiveness and the scope of our sustainability management across the entire RZB Group, we published the group-wide sustainability strategy “We create sustainable value” in 2013. This strategy consists of nine core action areas within which we focus our groupwide sustainability management. In order to systematically address these core areas, which are also important to our stakeholders, we continuously seek to improve our sustainability strategy. In identifying the core action areas, we rely not only on the perspective of our group but also on the perspectives of our stakeholders, who include our employees, customers, shareholders and suppliers as well as nongovernmental organizations and a number of other stakeholder groups. We carry out a multi-stage materiality analysis on a regular basis in order to prioritize these fields of activity. For this reason, as well as for the purpose of making any corrections to our sustainability strategy, we place great value on maintaining a dialog with our stakeholders.
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