Seventy per cent of New Zealand's exports depend on natural resources. That figure (from Chapman Tripp) is the clearest possible statement of how directly the work we do with our customers connects to the country's long-term security of strong economic performance.
Across the agricultural sector, conversations about soil quality, water quality and pasture management have been happening for years, for the same reason they happen now: a sustainable operation is the only kind you can hand on to the next generation. Those working the land are first to notice when a waterway, a soil profile, or a season starts behaving differently. We see our job as helping convert that awareness into an investment to restore and maintain the natural capital that it is drawn from, with finance structured to support businesses in managing that risk alongside opportunity.
At BNZ, looking after natural capital isn't a separate initiative sitting apart from how we lend or who we are as a bank. We're in this with our customers, and it has to be a collaboration for positive change on both sides of the relationship. A recent example of this is our partnership with Pāmu (Landcorp Farming Limited) with a new model that allows landowners to earn revenue from existing native forest, helping improve land and biodiversity, while giving businesses a method to account for carbon removals.
The same thinking sits behind our products, for example our Better Future home loans, which make it easier for households to finance solar, insulation or an EV, and our Green Business Loans and productivity offering, which help businesses electrify fleets and shift industrial and manufacturing capacity onto cleaner energy.
The clearest proof point of our efforts sits in our own numbers and the relationships we hold with our customers. In 2020 we committed to delivering $10 billion in sustainable finance, a target that was genuinely ambitious when we set it. We've since surpassed it with $10.8 billion delivered. What's driven that progress is working alongside customers who have their own ambition to put that capital to work. That's where our people and their expertise matter most: understanding our customers, caring about them, and staying with them over the long term.
It's clear that our prospects are tied to New Zealand's long-term economic stability, and investing in natural capital is fundamental to delivering this. But for scaling to happen, there needs to be clear pathways in place, and that work is where we’re focused: supporting customers to electrifying transport and industry, upgrading to greener infrastructure, and building resilience to a climate that will bring more extreme weather. None of it gets solved by one sector working alone.
That's a large part of why our partnership with The Aotearoa Circle matters to us. The Circle's mission, restoring the natural capital this country's prosperity depends on, is one we genuinely share.
We see real value in how The Aotearoa Circle creates a table where a bank, an exporter, government and tāngata whenua can work through the same problem together. There is real opportunity ahead, but the responsibility now is to protect what we have and to grow alongside it, with respect, not at its expense.
