Lord Mayor announces creation of UK China Green Finance Centre

Deal will build upon existing link-ups

City of London lord mayor Charles Bowman has announced the creation of a UK China Green Finance Centre in Beijing.

The center, which will receive up to 10 million pounds ($14.20 million) of funding from the UK and Chinese governments and private companies, will conduct research into new green finance products and raise investor awareness in this field.

The new center’s physical location and its specific projects are yet to be confirmed.

Speaking on Monday, Bowman said: “Combining our mutual experience and expertise in this area has already reaped many rewards, and the new center will allow us to go even further in our international ambitions”.

The initiative comes one week after a Chinese delegation led by the People’s Bank of China, known as PBoC, visited London to consult international experts on how to further internationalize China’s green finance market.

China, keen to combat domestic pollution, is now the world’s biggest issuer of green bonds, which are debt instruments that fund environmentally friendly projects, such as solar farms, wind farms and hydropower stations.

The new center will be chaired on the UK side by Roger Gifford, chairman of the City of London's Green Finance Initiative, and on the Chinese side by Ma Jun, chairman of the green finance committee of China Society for Finance and Banking, an organization under PBoC.

Ma said: “The UK and China partnership in green finance has been crucial to drive this agenda globally. We are keen to help propose solutions that suit both private and public sector participants.”