A Brief History:

• October 2002: Sharing common concerns over managing "non traditional" risks related to environmental and social issues, Citi joined forces with three other global financial institutions to develop a banking industry framework for addressing environmental and social risks in project financing that could be applied globally and across all industry sectors.
• October 2002 – May 2003: These four banks concluded that the best, most commonly known and widely tested environmental and social policy framework in the finance sector were those established and used in the emerging markets by the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the private sector investment arm of the World Bank Group. These standards included, at the time, IFC's environmental and social safeguard policies, pollution prevention and abatement guidelines, and risk categorization screening criteria. This led the banks to draft the first set of Equator Principles based on such policies and guidelines.
• June 4, 2003: The Equator Principles were officially launched in Washington, DC. The initial adopters included Citi and nine other global financial institutions. By 2009, the number of Equator Principles Financial Institutions had grown to over sixty-five.
• July 2006: The Equator Principles are updated to reflect the new IFC Performance Standards, which replaced the previous IFC Safeguard Policies. Citi was a lead author during the Equator Principles redrafting and revisions process. Citi re-adopts the updated Equator Principles along with 40 other financial institutions at an event in London.
• April 2007: IFC updates its Environmental Health and Safety (EHS) Guidelines, which the EPFIs incorporate into the Equator Principles.
• May 2008: The Equator Principles network celebrates its five year anniversary in Washington DC with more than 60 institutions as EPFI adopters.

In adopting the Equator Principles, a financial institution agrees to provide loans only to those projects whose borrowers can demonstrate their ability and willingness to comply with comprehensive processes aimed at ensuring that projects are developed in a socially responsible manner and according to sound environmental management practices. The full text of the Equator Principles can be found at www.equator-principles.com. The flowchart below illustrates Citi's typical project finance review and approval process to ensure compliance with the Equator Principles.

Citi took a central role in the 2006 EP updating process as principal co-drafter of the new Principles and in the subsequent outreach with clients, NGOs, SRIs and Export Credit Agencies. Citi remains an active leader in the EPFI network, and currently sits on the EPFI Steering Committee and leads a number of EPFI Working Groups.

The Equator Principles are a core component of our ESRM Policy. For more information on our ESRM Policy, please see our ESRM page. For reporting on Citi's implementation of the Equator Principles (including specific data on the number of project finance transactions reviewed and eventually funded) please see the Environmental section of our annual Citi Citizenship Report.