Our vision on impact | Triodos Bank

We envision a world where people have the tools and resources to live fulfilling lives. A world where the economy operates in harmony with nature and within planetary boundaries.

We are living in a crucial time in our history. The wave of change is happening and presents us with great opportunities for systemic transformation: from regenerative agriculture, empowering marginalised groups and smart energy solutions to circular economy businesses. We want to be one of the changemakers that accelerate this transformation through using money as a force for positive change and through advocacy.

As a values-driven financial institution we make money work for positive social, environmental and cultural change. To make sure our influence in these areas is positive we only finance sustainable enterprises, and we only use the ‘real’ money entrusted to us by savers and investors in the real economy.

Join us on our journey to create a prosperous life for people on a thriving planet.

The current structure of the food system lies at the centre of global problems. The preservation of ecosystems and the future wellbeing of the human population are all dependent on a structural transformation of the food system.

This transition theme is about ensuring a transition towards a sustainable, resilient and fair food system, producing healthy, safe and nutritious food for everyone.

Principles:

Everyone should have access to a healthy and affordable diet.
The food system should operate within the planetary boundaries and regional carrying capacity.
Sustainable agricultural production should restore and safeguard nature and support an adaptive and resilient food system.
The food system should rely on prosperous and equitable value chains which structurally support livelihoods and wellbeing and are free from human rights abuses.

Examples of relevant activities:

We only provide agricultural loans to organic and biodynamic farmers. In the Netherlands we provide conversion loans to help farmers transition towards organic farming.
Triodos Investment Management offers investment funds for the much-needed transition towards ecologically and socially resilient food and agriculture systems. It also provides funds investing in equity and bonds of companies in the areas of food processing, distribution and retail.
Triodos Regenerative Money Centre provides gift money and catalytic finance to facilitate the transition to regenerative farming.

Read Triodos Bank’s full vision on the food transition.

Our choice of materials directly impacts a variety of environmental, social and economic risks associated with producing goods. This ranges from labour conditions and trade flows to pollution, climate change, the loss of biodiversity and land use. Efforts need to be made to establish a circular management of all resources and materials to ensure that they can all be cycled indefinitely.

We want to move away from an extractive economy towards a regenerative one. Moving from the extract-use-dispose way of working to an economy that values natural resources by keeping them in the loop as long as possible. Goods should be produced responsibly, and consumption patterns should contribute to reduce resource waste.

Principles:

Resource extraction should be minimised whenever possible.
Materials and resources should be recycled at a continuously high value.
Buildings should be based on a conscious use of materials and be designed to exist in harmony with nature.
The global economic system should be based on responsible production and consumption of both goods and services.
Nature-based solutions should be encouraged wherever possible.

Examples of relevant activities:

We provide loans to organisations that have circular and sustainable business models. Having more sustainable building materials in properties is one of the main activities of Triodos Bank and is offered through (biobased) mortgages and its sustainable properties business loans.
Triodos Investment Management invests in equity and bonds of small, mid, and large cap companies on capital markets, analyzing and selecting strictly for their circularity efforts and intentions.
We have many advocacy activities targeted on how we use our natural resources, such as the Deforestation Regulation and the Nature Restoration law.

Read Triodos Bank's full vision on the resource transition.

Mitigating and adapting to climate change are key challenges of the 21st century, putting focus on our overall energy consumption and our dependence on fossil fuels. The world needs nothing short of a complete transformation of the energy system that is the foundation of our economies and future sustainable development. In addition to ramping up the amount of energy from renewable sources, serious cuts to overall energy demand are necessary to achieve a timely energy transition. A focus on energy democracy is key for the transition to be just. This transition theme focuses on fostering clean energy sources to make things move, heat up and cool down. This must reach all corners of society and the economy and address the mechanisms that ensure a just transition.

Underlying principles:

Energy systems should not undermine but rather contribute to a thriving natural environment.
Resilient, reliable and affordable energy should be accessible to all.
An efficient energy system should minimise resource use and waste.
Transportation of people and goods should safeguard planetary boundaries, people and communities.

Examples of relevant activities:

We provide loans to renewable energy projects. Supporting the installation of new renewable energy generation capacity and storage (from wind, solar or hydro energy) or energy savings and efficiency measures.
We provide mortgages and business loans to improve the energy efficiency of properties.
The energy transition is a focus point of three of the investment funds of Triodos Investment Management. We also invest in equity and bonds of companies that are active in energy production from renewable resources, such as solar and wind power.
Many of our advocacy activities are targeted on key interventions in the shift to more sustainable energy sources.

Read Triodos Bank’s full vision on the energy transition.

A sustainable economy works for all, leaving no one behind. While the world gradually mobilises to tackle the climate challenge, huge differences in wealth and opportunities still exist across society, sometimes exacerbated by environmental conditions. Such social divergence can also slow down the efforts to reach an economy that works within planetary boundaries. Inequality and social divides ultimately impact everyone, creating friction between individuals, within communities and across national borders.

The path towards a cohesive society starts with respect for fundamental human rights. It leads past access to resources, products and services, as well as markets to meet basic needs. And it continues beyond, through enhanced opportunities that ensure everyone’s voice is heard.

In this theme we focus on activities and services that contribute to this journey towards increasing cohesion and social empowerment.

Underlying principles:

A fair society should promote the empowerment of marginalised and vulnerable groups and individuals in all aspects of social life.
Everyone should have access to key products and services, such as housing, transport and essential bank-related services.
Everyone should have access to jobs and to fair and decent working conditions.
We should encourage solutions that shift the norms towards more inclusive and collaborative mindsets and lifestyles.

Examples of relevant activities:

We provide loans to organisations that provide affordable housing, accessible and inclusive health care and to other social enterprises. We also finance education initiatives and entrepreneurs in the arts and culture sector.
Triodos Investment Management has investment funds focused on financial inclusion and invests in equity and bond of companies that facilitate access to key products, services, and markets that broaden opportunities for marginalised groups and individuals to participate in cultural, political and social spaces.
Triodos Regenerative Money Centre provides gift money and catalytic finance to relatively early-stage companies in the food system that put societal return first.
Triodos Bank is co-founder of the Platform on Living Wages Financials (PLWF), an investor coalition consisting of 19 investors combining EUR 6.5 billion in assets under management. The participants collaboratively engage on the topic of living wages with their portfolio companies.

Read Triodos Bank’s full vision on social inclusion.

Our society can only thrive if all its members are physically and mentally healthy. We need to make a shift to ensure that we deeply value and nurture individual wellbeing for all. This means ensuring access to healthcare and care services and facilities for everyone, fostering quality education centered on providing opportunities for individuals to grow in their knowledge, skills, talents and aspirations and creating the conditions for healthy and fulfilling lifestyles, in which people can devote time and energy to their interests and hobbies, nurture their physical and spiritual sides, produce and enjoy arts and culture and cultivate their philosophy of life. Finally, telecommunication and consumer technologies should be at the service of individuals and have human dignity at their core.

This transition theme focuses on activities that foster individuals’ physical and mental health, as well as self-development, self-expression and healthy relationships with others.

Underlying principles:

All individuals should be supported in their health and wellbeing needs.
We should enable and encourage preventive healthcare.
Quality education should be encouraged and accessible to all.
Personal development should be activated through culture, creativity, self-expression and philosophy of life.
Technology should have human dignity at its core and support physical and mental wellbeing.

Examples of relevant activities:

We provide loans to organisations within the health care, education, arts and culture sectors.
Triodos Investment Management has two investment funds aimed at financial inclusion and it invests in equity and bonds of companies that contribute to progress and distribution of products and services within healthcare, household and personal care and lifestyle and leisure categories.
Triodos Regenerative Money Centre provides gift money and catalytic finance to relatively early-stage companies in the food system with a well-being focus on nutrition and health of individuals.

Read Triodos Bank's vision on social inclusion.

Triodos Bank aims to change the financial system from within by proving that values-based banking and impact investing is commercially robust and resilient. We strive for a sustainable, transparent and diverse financial sector that makes money work for positive change. We collaborate at a practical and strategic level with other European and global stakeholders, such as other values-based financial institutions, non-governmental organisations, governments and banking associations, to help grow a movement.

Our principles of Change Finance

A new kind of finance. We believe that the financial sector can benefit from the integration of four key concepts: sustainability in the broadest definition, impact, diversity and transparency. The (global) legal framework of all financial institutions and markets should be fundamentally revised on these principles.

1. A resilient, sustainable and inclusive economy

The financial sector is an essential part of society. It should serve the real economy and society as a whole: companies, social institutions, all of us as citizens and consumers. The financial sector plays a crucial role in supporting a resilient, sustainable and inclusive economy. As part of this mission, Triodos Bank focusses on the strategic themes of energy and climate, food and agriculture and social inclusion.

2. All finance is impact finance

All finance is impact finance. All decisions about the use of money have by nature an impact on people, communities, nature and society. Where money is invested in the real economy, something happens. By dealing with money in a conscious way, and aligning decisions about money with our values, one can make money work for people in a positive way.

3. Diversity in banking

A diverse banking system serves the diversity of our economies better and the stability of the financial system. We need banks of all sizes, not just a small number of large ones. Ultimately this is a challenge for governments and regulators, as well as banks. And we want to play our part in supporting other financial institutions through networks such as the Global Alliance for Banking on Values.

4. Transparent banking

Trust is a crucial part of the financial sector. There can only be trust, when the financial sector is transparent about its business models, its lending activity and investments, so stakeholders know how their money is used by their bank, and how their bank makes, or loses, its money.

Whilst this is something that needs to be led by consumer demand, Triodos Bank wants to serve as a reference point for the degree of transparency that is possible in banking. For that reason Triodos Bank publishes details of all its loans.

We actively participate in networks

Triodos Bank engages with a wide variety of stakeholders as part of its missions to change finance. We speak at key international events, partner with others to promote concrete changes to the European financial system. We act globally via networks such as the GABV , in Europe in the Finance Impact Hub of the Club of Rome, and locally via for instance the Sustainable Finance Lab in the Netherlands.

We engage with policy makers

We make our voice heard in national and European politics. We work together with others to make legislation and regulations for the financial sector more sustainable. We participate in roundtable discussions with politiciansand events on the European political stage. We make concrete proposals when new legislation and regulations are being prepared, which should lead to the entire financial sector taking more account of its impact on the world around us.

We contribute to universal principles

We are committed to universal principles that all financial institutions should adhere to. We worked on guidelines for the global banking sector to tackle societal problems. These UN Principles for Responsible Banking have been signed by more than 200 banks worldwide. Together with other financial institutions, we also signed the Finance for Biodiversity Pledge, committing ourselves to assessing, setting targets for and reporting on our own biodiversity impact.

We make impact measurable

It is important that banks can prove that they are improving their impact on the climate. In 2018, we started measuring the carbon emissions generated by our loans and investments. We did this using the Partnership for Carbon Accounting Financials (PCAF) method. PCAF was launched in 2015 by a group of Dutch financial institutions, including Triodos Bank, during the Paris Climate Conference. At the end of 2020, about 100 financial institutions participated. We are also one of the founding fathers of the Partnership for Biodiversity Accounting Financials (PBAF).

We encourage the financial sector

We encourage the financial sector to step up its climate ambitions. Triodos Bank has contributed to the climate agreement in the Netherlands by participating in talks about the agreement. Triodos Bank has also taken the initiative for a commitment from the financial sector to the climate agreement in the Netherlands. In Germany and Spain, we subsequently contributed to agreements by the financial sector to national climate agreements.

We actively contribute to sustainable transitions

We also actively contribute to the transitions in the areas of energy and climate, food and agriculture and social inclusion. We want to share our 40-years expertise and knowledge of sustainable economic activities and how to finance them to help foster demanded transitions.

We have published vision papers on strategic topics, such as energy & climate and food & agriculture and played a central role in climate commitments in the Netherlands, Germany and Spain.

Our focus on impact dictates which sectors we finance and how we finance them. In our case, that means only financing the entrepreneurs and enterprises that create positive change. We publish details of every organisation we finance on our website, so you can see for yourself how your money delivers positive change for people and planet.

Discover our impact near you

Triodos Bank has a community of over 746,000 customers and has 23.2 billion euro in total assets under management. We have banking activities in the Netherlands, Belgium, the UK, Spain, and Germany and investment management activities globally.

View our integrated annual report

Stories that reflect the core goals of an organisation are crucial to understanding its true impact. Meet one of our inspiring Triodos Bank customers.

In ‘Pioneering impact finance in energy and housing’ we are sharing a blueprint for real impact measurement, starting with our energy transition and mortgage portfolios.

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Our vision for a prosperous life for people on a thriving planet

It's time to act

Translating complexity into targeted action

Change Finance

1. A resilient, sustainable and inclusive economy

2. All finance is impact finance

3. Diversity in banking

4. Transparent banking

Finance Change

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Our impact in practice

Our blueprint for impact measurement

A clear choice for sustainable banking

Prevented negative impact of our energy transition and mortgage portfolios in 2024

Our financing of the energy transition avoided EUR 269 million of negative impact in 2024

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1. A resilient, sustainable and inclusive economy

2. All finance is impact finance

3. Diversity in banking

4. Transparent banking

Want to discover more?

For more on our impact

Know where your money goes