CSR
Rabo Fastracks launch
ESTABLISHING A STRATEGIC FOCUS
Americas
Asia Europe
In June of2008, the Rabobank International organisation in the Americas
offcially kicked ojfits Corporate Social Responsibility CSR) program.
Rabobank in the Americas has been active in its Local communities since
the New York office opened in 1981. But the approach was largely ad hoe
and varied from location to location.
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"Given the organisational maturity we
have achieved here after 25 years and
ourestablished business position in the
Americas," says Guillermo Bilbao, Deputy
Regional Manager of the Americas
and regional CSR Business Champion,
"the time is right for a region-wide,
organised commitment to CSR."
The Rl Americas CSR committee has
already made strong progress. So far,
the committee has:
Authored a statement of commitment
to CSR
Established working sub-committees,
including:
Philanthropy/Community Outreach
Environmental and Employee
Sustainability
CSR/Client Relationships
Launched a new CSR section on the
Americas intranet, AmNet
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Agreed on three specific areas of focus
for charitable outreach:
Hunger, Poverty Disaster Relief
Natural Resource Preservation
Sustainable Agribusiness
Medical Research Disease Prevention
Bilbao sees 2008 as a year of learning in
the Americas organisation, one in which
Rabobankers come up to speed on CSR,
take part in the bank's growing activities,
and evaluate ways we can add value to
ourclients.
"Small changes can have big effects,"
says Bilbao, "especially if we make it a
group effort. This year is about becoming
conscious of what we are doing as
employees, what we are doing in our
communities, and what our clients need."
Rabobank's indices, Rabo Fastracks
Asia Pacific Top 20 and Global ex-Asia
Top 20, feature companies from 5 Food
Agribusiness sectors, which the Food
Agribusiness Research and Advisory team
believe offer value in the medium to long
term. Competitor indices focus on the
commodities themselves, such as energy
and crops, which many believe may have
peaked.
Since July, GFM's Client Product Group has
attracted much media attention with the
launch of its first equity-linked F&A indices.
These equity-linked indices mark the next
investment phase in food and agribusiness,
following the commodities boom. Press
articlesfeatured in the Financial Times,
Bloomberg and other leading Asian
publications.
The marketing of these indices commenced
in July for Asia and Jean-Marc Debricon
indicated that "in Europe, the indices will be
launched with a full scale road show after the
holiday period. This is an exciting product
and investors will appreciate that Rabobank
has an obvious alignment of interest when it
comes to F&A matters."
Finally, Donal Galvin, GFM Head of the
Client Products Group, added that the
Fastracks indices had performed in line with
the leading commodity indices over the
preceding quarter.
Jean-Marc Debricon, GFM's head
of Structuring, stresses the
importance of the cooperation
with FAR: "We're not selling another
commodity investment product
but we are selling the expertise
of FAR in a GFM format."
The FAR team has been crucial in developing
this investor product and in their research
paper The Boom beyond Commodities'.
They state that "the current commodity
cycle is different from those that have gone
beforedue to the emergence of the
bio-fuel industry." Past cycles have seen
peaks and troughs, but the addition of fuel,
the fourth 'f', to the other factors driving
demand, namelyfood,feed and fïbre,
means "demand will remain strong over
the coming years."
ISSUE 17
THE WORD
