LISTEN | Talking green: Funding sustainability for your business

Businesses that specialise in sustainable products are estimated to spend between $200 000 to $500 000 on product development, a figure more than triple the $45 000 that is spent by small businesses on non-sustainable products.

For businesses looking to go green, these figures might seem scary however Mark Boshoff, Head of Climate Resilience and Sustainability Strategy at Nedbank Commercial Banking, says that over the years access to sustainability funding has grown significantly.

“In the past, there was very much a lack of access to funding in sustainability. If you think of sustainability especially solar or renewable energy, it's something that has to be purchased over and above what you normally do in your business. So you were buying a non-core asset just to keep the business going, and people were struggling to find access to it,” Boshoff says.

Boshoff recently sat down with News24 to discuss how sustainability funding can help take your business to the next level, as well as the return on investment it provides.

Listen to the podcast below

“Access to finance has become far more, easier for clients. There's also a lot of innovative finance that is happening, where we looking at the type of asset, this is not a factory machine or a piece of equipment that you're going to be using. It's very specialised, especially in solar or renewable energy, and has a much longer payback period,” he says.

To help clients manage the time stipulated to pay back the sustainability loans, Nedbank has increased the time period and has also made it more accessible to businesses in good financial standing.

“Nedbank has quite a few offerings that can assist with this [sustainability funding]. We've had a look at not just your end user. So for the end user, you can finance your equipment and can finance it over a longer period of up to 10 years because as we've said before renewable energy has a much longer payback period, It was seven to eight years in the past. Traditional financing was about five, to six years, and it just didn't make sense for this kind of asset. We also don't typically ask for deposits where clients are in good financial standing, Says Boshoff.

Listen to the podcast above and, click HERE to find out more about the benefits of sustainability funding and how the green bank can help your business.