Scottish Taskforce for Green and Sustainable Financial Services Final Report: SG Response

Foreword

Boosting fair, green economic growth is central to our priorities. Our Programme for Government sets out our four key priorities for the coming year, including reiterating our ambitions for a just transition to net zero supporting our people, communities, environment and growing our economy. The recently published Green Industrial Strategy has a clear overarching aim: to help Scotland realise the economic benefits of the global transition to net zero. There are few areas of greater competitive advantage and potential than Green and Sustainable Financial Services. Set in this context, it is with particular pleasure and optimism that I welcome the report of Scotland’s Taskforce for Green and Sustainable Financial Services.

Recognising the scale of the transition needed at home and abroad, the Scottish Government identified that there would be continued and growing demand for green financial products and services from established global financial hubs like Scotland. We also recognised that we could play a key role in helping the UK become the world’s first net zero aligned financial centre.

We established this Taskforce to examine important questions, such as: how could Scotland’s financial services industry leverage the enormous investment that will flow into Net Zero projects and assets, both here and abroad, to build up a Green Financial Services cluster? And, how do we maximise the potential for skilled jobs, growth and exports?

We knew that Scotland could be a natural home for green and sustainable finance because the foundations are strong– in Scotland, large financial institutions are clustered alongside professional services firms, energy and technical experts, and specialist businesses across a range of disciplines. The world saw in Glasgow 2021, that Scotland had both a progressive energy and climate change policy at home, and the convening power to deliver real advances on climate finance on the global stage.

Set amidst that backdrop, this Taskforce set about its work, ensuring public and private sector alignment through reporting to the Financial Services Growth and Development Board. The group is comprised of leading experts from industry and academia, chaired ably by David Pitt-Watson. David, the taskforce membership and the Global Ethical Finance Initiative team have worked incredibly hard over the past two years to produce this impressive final report, which sets out a framework of recommendations that will help Scotland become a true global contender in the race to capture the economic opportunities that the growth in green and sustainable financial services presents.

The taskforce identified the four key priority areas they believed would help move Scotland forward:

• Promoting Scotland as a Centre of Green Finance
• Finding Investment for Green Projects in Scotland
• Sustaining a World Class Training and Education Offering
• New Opportunities

The 31 recommendations, for both Scottish Government and industry partners, are grouped around these four key areas. The Scottish Government will work at pace to consider and deliver against those recommendations for which we are responsible. By publishing our response today, I hope I am demonstrating our desire to seize the opportunity.

Of course, not all the recommendations are for the Scottish Government, so I now call on the industry as a whole to work with us – and together – proactively and constructively to advance Scotland’s cause to become “the natural home for green and sustainable finance.”

I would like to thank everyone who has contributed to this taskforce – David Pitt-Watson, Chris Tait and the GEFI Team, our industry partners at SFE, the taskforce membership and colleagues across the public sector.

The Taskforce have given us our roadmap. We now know what needs to be done. By working together, we can accelerate the transition of the economy to net zero, create good jobs at home and, as we build up domestic expertise, boost services exports abroad.

Kate Forbes MSP

Deputy First Minister of Scotland and Cabinet Secretary for Economy and Gaelic