[SDG Forum Series 2023–24] How “Green” is Green Finance?

Speaker:           Dr Edwin Mok (The Chinese University of Hong Kong) and Mr Alpha Chia (BDO Hong Kong)

Moderator:        Prof Darwin Choi (The Chinese University of Hong Kong)

Date：22/02/2024

Time：7:00 – 8:30 p.m. (GMT+8, HKT)

Venue：LT4, 2/F, Yasumoto International Academic Park, CUHK

Forum to be conducted in Cantonese

On-site participation only.

Limited seats in the lecture theatre. First come first served.

Brief Description

Join us for an enlightening talk on green finance and investment in Hong Kong and explore the finance sector’s role in constructing a sustainable future. Dr Edwin Mok will give us an overview of green finance development in Hong Kong and other Asian economies, green fintech technologies, challenges and solutions, as well as the future prospects and development of green finance. Mr Alpha Chia will share his experience as an ESG consultant. He will walk us through the latest trends in the local market and the landscape of ESG reporting in Hong Kong. The talk will also discuss on what the government has done thus far and provide suggestions for future development. This talk is highly relevant to several Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), in particular, SDG 8 (Decent Work and Economic Growth), SDG 9 (Industry, Innovation, and Infrastructure), SDG 11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities) and SDG 17 (Partnerships for the Goals).

About the Moderator

Professor Darwin Choi is an Associate Professor in the Department of Finance and Associate Director of the Centre for Business Sustainability at The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK). Before joining CUHK in 2016, he was an Assistant Professor of Finance at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST). He received his PhD degree in Finance from Yale University and BS in Economics and BS in Engineering degrees from the University of Pennsylvania. Prof. Choi’s research examines how institutional details and behavioural factors influence professional and individual investors’ capital allocations and asset prices. His recent work focuses on climate finance and other ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) issues. Prof. Choi’s papers have been published in the Journal of Finance, Journal of Financial Economics, and Review of Financial Studies. He has won teaching awards at both CUHK Business School and HKUST Business School.

About the Speakers

Dr Edwin Mok is a Lecturer in the Department of Finance at The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) Business School. He is teaching undergraduate courses including financial management, financial markets, investment analysis and portfolio management, options and futures, as well as financial analysis with Bloomberg and Excel. His main research interests include corporate finance, empirical asset pricing and IPO markets. Dr Mok has worked on several projects with Education Bureau of the Hong Kong Government and worked with The Hong Kong Academy for Gifted Education to provide programmes for gifted students to nurture their entrepreneurial mindset. Dr Mok is passionate about teaching and has won several teaching awards before. He applied for Courseware Development Grant Scheme to strengthen the course components, participated in teaching and learning conference, and is running YouTube channels to share personal finance knowledge with students and the public.

Dr Mok has recently co-authored a Green Fintech Report 2023 report titled “The Intersection of Green, Fin, and Tech: A Study across 5 APEC Economies” which provides deeper insights into the developmental landscape of Green Fintech across five APEC economies, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Thailand, The Republic of Korea (South Korea), and Singapore.

Mr Alpha Chia is a manager of risk advisory services. Alpha has more than 10 years of experience in the environmental industry. After graduating from The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Alpha joined several main contracting construction companies in Hong Kong. He started as an assistant environmental officer and gradually became a project environmental manager with years of experience. His projects ranged from green buildings to ISO 14064, 14001 audit etc. He is qualified as a BEAM Pro NB 1.2 and 2.0. He was also responsible for drafting environmental management plans, sustainable management reports, etc.

Alpha then joined HKQAA and was responsible for environmental project management in the intelligence business department, focusing on green finance, sustainability-linked loans and TCFD. As a project manager, he developed, maintained, and monitored the quality of the technical consultation services in sustainability finance provided by the company to be delivered in an effective, efficient, and reliable way. He was a qualified lead assessor for green bond/loan and sustainability-linked loans and was a TCFD trainer in-house. He is one of the authors for five sets of “Green Finance Implementation Guidebook for SME” in 2022 under TCF funding.

Free admission, all are welcome.

Enquiry：sdg-ouge@cuhk.edu.hk

Online reservation：https://cloud.itsc.cuhk.edu.hk/webform/view.php?id=13682982