Company: INGVF
Filing Date: 2025-03-06
Form Type: 20-F
Source: 0001628280-25-010764
Chunk: 77

Company: ING GROEP NV
Filing Date: 2025-03-06
Form: 20-F
Item: Item 4
Chunk 77
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, environmental and social risks related to their biofuels business, and manage and mitigate these risks 

ING Group Annual Report 2024 on Form 20-F 

Contents       Part I         Part II        Part III       Additional information        Financial statements    
responsibly. This includes a request to the client to have a sustainable sourcing policy, including supplier standards, in place together with regular monitoring.
As a financial institution, we do not have sustainable land, agriculture, oceans or seas policies in places for our own operations. Under our ESG Risk Policy, we do however encourage our clients to have such policies in accordance with sector initiatives such as Rainforest Alliance Sustainable Agriculture Standard, UTZ Certified Sustainable Agriculture Practice Standard, and Sustainable Agriculture Initiative Platform. For deforestation information, see the next section.
While the ESG Risk Policy and its assessment addresses both environmental and social risks, only if risks are identified does a more in-depth assessment take place that may connect biodiversity and ecosystem-related impacts to social consequences.
Our deforestation and ecosystem conversion approach actions 
Deforestation and other forms of ecosystem conversion is contributing significantly to the demise of species, reducing population sizes, potentially up to the point of extinction. ING’s impact is largely connected to activities of global Wholesale Banking clients in the commodity, food and agriculture sectors, active in cattle, palm oil, soy, cocoa, and coffee. Even though ING is not in scope of EU Deforestation Regulation, we did develop an engagement approach to address deforestation and ecosystem conversion, which was updated in 2024. We map high-risk commodities and clients via an annually published assessment, and encourage in-scope clients to put in place:
1.Commitments to achieve no-deforestation and no-ecosystem conversion
2.Actions and targets to work towards full traceability in their supply chains.
Full traceability helps to verify whether and where adverse impacts occur. We recognise, however, that not all our clients currently have full traceability and therefore plan to engage with our clients to discuss where they stand and what their commitment is. Biodiversity offsetting and incorporation of local and indigenous knowledge or nature-based solutions may occur but are currently not formally part of this approach. For the proportion of clients unable or unwilling to progress on the conditions set by ING, we may as of 2027, on a case-by-case basis, apply stricter credit conditions on the client, or cease financing them altogether. 
Our Equator Principles actions
The Equator Principles (EPs) are a risk management framework adopted by financial institutions for