JOHANNESBURG - South Africa's Nedbank said on Wednesday it was launching the country's first sustainable development vehicle to mark the advent of the global Earth Summit taking place in Johannesburg later this month. "The Fund is a Domestic General Equity Fund and aims to provide investors with long-term capital growth over three to five years, by tracking the performance of a customised Sustainability Index," Nedbank said in a statement.
The Nedbank Sustainable Investment Index Fund would weight South Africa's top 40 companies with a sustainability score reflecting compliance with international best practice, it said. Colin Donian, the managing director of Nedcor Bank Management Company Ltd, said the launch was not an opportunistic event, as Nedbank had a long track record of actively supporting environmental and social issues.
"...We believe that having such an Index and Fund in the public domain places a certain amount of public pressure on companies to follow sustainable business practices," he said.
Potential investors would need a minimum lump sum of 2,000 rand or a monthly minimum contribution of 300 rand to invest in the fund, Nedbank said.:
