Bank advisors on a sustainability mission
Farmers would like a dialogue with Nykredit’s agricultural advisors on green solutions. This is what Birgitte Berg Laustsen is experiencing. She and her colleagues have just been trained in sustainability
“How would you like to make your farming greener?”
Birgitte Berg Laustsen, Senior Agricultural Advisor at the Agricultural Centre in Central and West Jutland, is more frequently discussing feed changes for dairy cows and new slurry plants for slaughter pigs as a natural part of her work.
It’s about reducing pollution from agriculture and making it more sustainable. Nykredit has just trained all its agricultural advisors in sustainability in the past year.
The goal is to make the advisors better sparring partners for customers on greener solutions.
Major change
“The training in sustainability has been really good. Amongst other things, I have greatly benefited from learning more about how to inquire about topics relating to sustainability. I feel I can talk to people about it in an understandable way now”, says Birgitte Berg Laustsen.
Agriculture emits a lot of CO2, and there is a desire from all sides to focus on climate-friendly solutions, something she also notices amongst her customers.
“It’s very rare for someone to say they want to wait until they can’t put it off any longer. Most people want to be at the forefront and do their part for sustainable change”.
Agricultural adviser Birgitte Berg Lausten with one of her customers, board chair for dlg, Niels Dengsø Jensen.
When Birgitte Berg Lausten started as an agricultural advisor 24 years ago, environmental issues were not something that was easy to discuss. But it’s a different matter now that Nykredit is both a bank and a mortgage bank for many farmers and society has a completely different focus on the environment.
“We don’t have to be specialists, but I can get into a higher-level dialogue with the customers and talk to them about green solutions that others have had success with”.
An extra dimension
Tonny Thierry Andersen, Group Director of Banking in Nykredit, says that the training has given the advisors an extra dimension to work with:
“Since we are a group-owned company and also the largest lender to agriculture, we have an opportunity to contribute to the green transition in the sector. We were already doing this by offering green loans, but by training our advisors in sustainability, they also get an extra green dimension now.”
Initiatives for sustainability
Nykredit also works with sustainability elsewhere in the Group. Specific targets for emissions from owner-occupied homes and properties the Group has granted loans for were recently published. According to Nykredit, the targets were the first of their kind in Denmark for these target groups.