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"Our purpose is to have an integrated green mission on global warming and sustainable business development" |
Whatever the ultimate motives, Doha Bank (whose chairman is a member of Qatar’s Al Thani ruling family) is preparing a $1 billion sukuk to be issued in September that will kick-start a sustainable investment fund for green projects. "It’s part of a core mission to add value to society," says Raghavan Seetharaman, chief executive of Qatar’s third-largest lender. Seetharaman claims that interest in what he calls the bank’s "green mission" has come from European and southeast Asian investors, as well as businessmen and governments from across the Gulf.
Doha Bank’s Green Mission, which will be financed by the fund, already has a chief executive lined up. In addition, according to Seetharaman, the bank has identified experts everywhere from the US to Japan and Singapore who would be able to advise on investments.
Seetharaman says the sustainable investment fund will take stakes in projects for green energy such as biomass and biofuel worldwide. It will support solar energy projects in the Gulf in particular.
Doha Bank is also helping set up, as part of the Green Mission, a carbon credits trading exchange in Qatar’s two-year-old Energy City. Seetharaman estimates that the platform will cost some $150 million to establish. A plot of land worth $7 million has already been bought. Designs for the exchange are being reviewed, with building due to start later this year.
"The project manager we have recruited knows various options around the world where we can deploy this fund in multiple forms.
"Our purpose is to have an integrated green mission on global warming and sustainable business development," says Seetharaman.
Qatar is not alone in the Gulf’s awakening to green issues. The government of Abu Dhabi has established the Masdar clean energy fund, with start-up capital of $250 million. One of its projects includes a completely carbon- and waste-free city for 50,000 people to be known as Masdar City.
The Gulf Cooperation Council itself, according to Seetharaman, has plans for a Climate Fund amounting to billions of dollars, under an initiative headed by Qatar’s Crown Prince Tamim.
Still, the GCC has some catching up to do. Entering the word "green" into the English language section of the EU’s website brings up more than 18,506 results. On the GCC’s website, however, a similar search yields precisely zero, while entering the word "oil" is distinctly more fruitful.
