Press Releases

UniCredit supports Earth Hour for the 14th consecutive year

• Lights will be switched off at three buildings in Austria and in 45 buildings across the Group

Tomorrow, Saturday 27 March at 8.30pm CET, UniCredit will turn off the lights in 45 of its buildings across 14 countries (Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovenia, Slovakia and United Kingdom) for sixty minutes marking the Group's fourteenth consecutive year of taking part in Earth Hour. Organised by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), this is a global movement uniting people to take action on environmental issues and help protect the planet.

Robert Zadrazil, CEO of UniCredit Bank Austria: “As a major lender to the economy, the shift to a sustainable economy is a high priority for UniCredit Bank Austria. Therefore, in August 2020 we concluded a cooperation agreement with WWF Austria under which WWF supports Bank Austria in setting sustainability targets for the loan portfolio. UniCredit Bank Austria will anchor these targets in the credit approval process. We also want to set a good example as a company, so we were able to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 85 per cent and waste by 90 per cent from 2008 to the end of 2020. Since the beginning of 2020, we have also been sourcing 100 per cent of our electricity from renewable energy sources.”

Giuseppe Zammarchi, Head of Group Sustainability, said: “Our annual participation in Earth Hour is part of UniCredit’s wider efforts to support sustainability and take action against climate change. We are committed to reducing the environmental impact of our operations as well as assisting our clients in the transition to a low carbon and climate resilient economy. Sustainability is part of our DNA and core values as a bank and we continue to further integrate ESG across all areas of our operations and business. In 2020, UniCredit achieved a 60 percent reduction versus its 2008 GHG emissions with the long-term target of an 80 percent reduction by 2030”.

A further example of the bank’s strong commitment to sustainability is the partnership with Treedom, an online platform which allows people to plant trees remotely and follow their growth online. This initiative was launched in 2020 and will create the UniCredit Forest consisting of at least 90,000 new trees, which will be planted across: Italy, Colombia, Haiti, Kenya, Madagascar and Tanzania. The UniCredit Forest will help reduce global CO2 by approximately 20,542,500 kg over the next 10 years, equivalent to emissions produced by around 4,400 cars each year.

The main UniCredit buildings participating in Earth Hour this year are listed below
 

Enquiries
UniCredit Bank Austria Press Office
Volker Moser, Tel. +43 (0)5 05 05-52854
Email: volker.moser@unicreditgroup.at