• Profile
  • TSKB in Brief
  • TSKB's Subsidiaries
  • Products and Services Of TSKB
• Performance
  • Value Creation
  • Awards & Recognitions
  • CEO's Assessment
• Approach
  • TSKB's Sustainable Banking Strategy
  • TSKB's Sustainability Priorities
• Dialogue
  • TSKB and Stakeholder Engagement
  • TSKB's Stakeholders
  • 2010 Stakeholder Dialogue Highlights
• Sustainability and Environmental Issues
  • Sustainable Banking at TSKB
  • Sustainable Banking Performance: the Economic Dimension
  • The Renewable Energy Sector and TSKB
  • TSKB Energy Index
  • TSKB, Climate Change, and the Environment
  • TSKB's Efforts on Behalf of Sustainability and the Environment
  • Who Wouldn't Want to Be Sustainable?
  • ISO 14001 Certification
  • The Structure of the TSKB Environmental Management Team
  • TSKB's Environment Policy
  • TSKB's Environmental Impact
  • Sustainable Banking Performance: the Environmental Dimension
  • Developments in External Environmental Impact
• Corporate Governance
  • Absolute Compliance With Laws and Regulations
  • TSKB's Corporate Governance Structure
  • Compliance With Corporate Governance Principles
  • Risk Management at TSKB
  • Prevention of Money-Laundering and the Financing of Terrorism
  • Relations with Suppliers
• People
  • Human Resources and the Workplace at TSKB
  • The TSKB Performance Management System
  • TSKB Compensation and Reward System
  • TSKB Human Resources Structure
  • Human Rights and Employee Rights at TSKB
  • Competency Development and Training
  • Health and Safety at TSKB
  • Commuting By Sea
  • Internal Communication at TSKB
• The Community
  • Social Responsibility at TSKB
  • "Environment: Our Priority": Past and present
  • The NGOs that TSKB Collaborates with
• Summarized TSKB Goals and Performance
• Appendices
  • About This Report
  • Statement GRI Application Level Check
  • Global Reporting Initiative Cross Index
  • Online Sustainability
  • Imprint
  • Communication and Service Channels

SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY AT TSKB

TSKB has been contributing to Turkey’s growth and development for sixty-one years.
For more than six decades TSKB has been a powerhouse driving Turkey’s advance towards economic growth and development but it has also been an engine of the country’s social progress as well. In 2010, the Bank continued to engage in corporate social responsibility activities aimed at increasing public awareness and sensitivity about such critical issues as climate change, energy, and the environment which are vital to our world’s future.

Since 2007, TSKB has been actively and effectively integrating its sustainable banking philosophy as a fundamental component of its social responsibility projects. In the conduct of such projects, the Bank also deals with environmental, energy, and sustainability issues and makes a significant contribution towards increasing public awareness about them. The Bank’s environmental mission summed up in the slogan “At TSKB, the environment is our priority” also served as the basis for the social responsibility and community awareness projects which it undertook in its 61st year of operation.

TSKB celebrates its 61st year
TSKB celebrated its 61st year of operation with a series of events and activities that it proudly conducted all year long. TSKB communicated with all of its stakeholders through its “A 60-year symphony” slogan. In addition to serving as a reminder of its sustainable banking mission, this campaign also drew attention to the added value which TSKB creates for the Turkish economy.

“Turning of Wings” take flight with TSKB
TSKB celebrated its 61st anniversary with the publication of Turning of Wings, a book by author and photographer Özcan Yüksek. Accompanied by Yüksek’s stunning photographs, Turning of Wings tells the story of the wind and windmills while also contributing towards TSKB efforts to achieve a future in which the energy of the wind is no longer wasted.

One of the oldest and most enduring forms of renewable energy, windpower has experienced a strong increase in attention as a potential energy resource in recent years throughout the world. Through images captured by Yüksek’s insightful eye and through texts composed by an author with something meaningful to say, Turning of Wings draws attention to the importance of renewable energy resources and of sustainability through the use of wind and windmills as metaphors. An English-language version of Turning of Wings was prepared to send out the same message to the Bank’s international stakeholders.

The Bank's environmental mission summed up in the slogan "At TSKB, the environment is our priority" also served as the basis for the social responsibility and community awareness projects which it undertook in its 61st year of operation.

TSKB, UNEP FI, and BAT lead a debate about sustainability in the Turkish financial sector
TSKB was the prime sponsor and a co-organizer of “Environmental and Social Risk Management for the Turkish Financial Sector”, a seminar that was held at TSKB on 8 October 2010. Among the subjects discussed at the event, whose other co-organizers were UNEP Finance Initiative (UNEP FI) and Banks Association of Turkey (BAT), were taking environmental and social risks into account in credit and lending projects, identifying the next step to ensure effective implementation of risk analyses, and providing seminar participants with guidance on strategies and tools.

Speakers at the seminar were TSKB Engineering Manager Hülya Kurt, HVB/Unicredit Group Environmental and Social Risk Practitioner Karen Wendt, and UNEP FI Instructor Christina Wood.

A joint TSKB-KfW seminar exploring the subject of “Energy Efficiency”
TSKB, which controls an extensive portfolio of energy and environment project financing investments, and KfW, which supports the growth and development of companies that commit themselves to combating climate change, co-organized a seminar on the subject of energy efficiency. The opening speech at the seminar was delivered by TSKB Senior Executive Vice President Orhan Beşkök while participants discussed energy efficiency in industry within the framework of sustainability.

Other speakers at the event, which took place at TSKB on September 28th, were Erdal Çalıkoğlu (Assistant General Manager of the Electrical Power Resources Survey and Development Administration), Olaf Zymelka (KfW Head of the Energy and Transportation Divisions for Southeastern Europe and Turkey), Sabine Piller (Berliner Energieagentur Group Leader of Energy Efficiency and Renewability Potential and Practices in the Industry Sector), Christopher Soldwedel (CEO of EPROPLAN GmbH), Ahmet Işıklar (Hayat Kimya), and Kaya Tütengil and Cemil Yaman (Siemens).

AFD Development Professions Study Seminar
On October 18th, TSKB played host to a study seminar on the subject of “development professions”.

These seminars are organized annually by the French Development Agency (AFD), which conducts them in a different country each year. Among the presentations made at the seminar, which was also attended by 30 AFD management trainees, were TSKB Department of Economics Manager Refik Akıncı’s “61 years of development at TSKB” and TSKB Engineering Department Manager Hülya Kurt’s “Sustainable banking at TSKB”.

Through the events attended, TSKB has continued to raise its awareness and sensitivity concerning the issues such as climate change, energy and environment, which is crucial in terms of the world’s future.

TSKB takes part in the 29th Energy Efficiency Week.
During the 29th Energy Efficiency Week, whose events took place this year at the WOW Convention Center in İstanbul on January 13th, TSKB took part in a panel discussion concerning the financing of energy efficiency projects. TSKB CEO Halil Eroğlu took part in the discussion as the panel’s moderator and TSKB Senior Executive Vice President Orhan Beşkök as a speaker. During the discussions TSKB officials provided participants with information about the support which the Bank gives for investments in energy efficiency, renewable energy, and environmental issues. A TSKB-operated stand also provided opportunities to engage in interactive communication with stakeholders during the event.

www.cevreciyiz.TV
One minute a day is enough to make a difference! cevreciyiz.TV, Turkey’s most comprehensive environment-related video portal, continued to broadcast successfully in 2010. cevreciyiz.TV, a website which broadcasts videos about many different environment-related topics and which invites everyone to share videos of their own about such subjects, seeks to be the most comprehensive visual archive that all people can continuously watch and take advantage of. www.cevreciyiz.com continues to broadcast as Turkey’s richest-content environmental portal… www.cevreciyiz.com continues to broadcast successfully in order to make a society-wide impact by contributing towards environmental issue-related awareness and knowledge and in line with TSKB’s “Environment: Our Priority” mission.	www.cevreciyiz.com contains a wide range of features and interactive sections such as current news; Turkey’s and the world environment agenda; essays and research studies by academicians, NGOs, and professionals; special environment files; environment-related laws and regulations; corporate success stories; virtual photography exhibitions of work by famous nature photographers; and tools such as a carbon-meter that allows you to measure carbon footprints. During 2010, www.cevreciyiz.com also joined a number of social networks in keeping with its aim of reaching out to as many people as possible.

TSKB's social responsibility mission is structured around the basic idea of increasing social awareness and sensitivity about issues, including but not limited to climate change, which constitute risks for our world and its people.