Citibank Korea's social contribution programs drive real change

Citibank Korea leads efforts to mitigate climate change through “Change Now for Tomorrow,” a climate action partnership signed with World Wide Fund for Nature Korea (WWF-Korea). Courtesy of Citibank Korea

By Yi Whan-woo

Citibank Korea is stepping up efforts to diversify its social contribution programs based on the three principles of employee participation, long-term commitment and leading activity.

The programs are designed go beyond charity and drive real change through contributions, in partnership with non-profit organizations that coordinate programs together while receiving long-term support from the bank.

The bank encourages its employees to participate voluntarily in these programs in various ways, such as through donating their talents.

“We are planning and implementing social contribution programs to encourage direct participation and empathy from our employees beyond just simple support and participation,” a Citibank Korea official said. “Our social contribution efforts will continue to support those in desperate need in a meaningful way so that local communities and recipients can actually improve their quality of life.”

The representative social contribution activities include: “Citi Global Community Day,” “Citi Building Hope and Home,” “Think Money” and “Ewha-Citi Global Finance Academy.”

“Citi Global Community Day” began in 2006 to bring employees and their families around the world together to give back to the communities in which they live and work through various service activities.

Beginning in 1998, “Citi Building Hope and Home” is to build homes for those who can't afford one of their own in small and medium-sized cities nationwide. Citibank Korea was the first company in Korea to join hands with Habitat for Humanity Korea through this program.

“Think Money” has provided financial education to about 560,000 teenagers to date. The “Ewha-Citi Global Finance Academy” has been running since 2001 to cultivate talented young people in the finance field, and the “Citi-Kyung Hee Univ. NGO Internship Program” was launched in 2006 to nurture civil society leaders.

Each of these programs has been conducted for more than 10 years with the voluntary participation of the employees of Citibank Korea as lecturers, volunteers and mentors.

Additionally, the bank has conducted separate programs since 2017 to support enterprises and venture companies by implementing a variety of solutions to address social issues and to help these smaller companies continue to expand.

In 2017, the bank established the “Korea Social Enterprise Awards” with Joyful Union, a Korean microcredit organization, to recognize social enterprises for their commitment to creating jobs and addressing social issues facing the socially underprivileged, as well as to spread best practices.

Also in 2017, the bank launched the “Impact Career Y” youth program with Root Impact to nurture talented youth to address social issues. The program is designed to help find jobs for youth who want to deal with social issues in innovative ways.

Regarding fulfilling environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) principles, which have drawn greater corporate interest in recent years, the bank has continued its efforts as a responsible social contributor.

For the environment, Citibank Korea has led efforts to mitigate climate change through “Change Now for Tomorrow,” a climate action partnership signed with World Wide Fund for Nature Korea (WWF-Korea).

The partnership aimed at achieving the goal of keeping the global average temperature rise below 1.5 degrees Celsius.

The partnership also conducts various activities to raise awareness among companies about how serious climate change is and how important climate action is.

A case point is the “Climate Action Roundtable,” which provides practical guidelines and shares more specific action plans to ensure that more domestic companies participate in climate action to bring about a carbon-neutral era.

The bank is holding green campaigns internally to encourage the making of a more sustainable society, including by reducing plastic consumption and use of disposable products.

Among them, an environment improvement campaign is being carried out within the company to reduce unnecessary office supplies and collect and share available resources.