On April 12, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) decided to establish the Inclusive Finance Department at the Head Office to enhance small and micro enterprise (SME) financial services and address financing challenge faced by small and medium-sized enterprises via specialized business operation and differential assessment.

ICBC has been focused on serving the real economy and assuming social responsibility in inclusive finance. By the end of March 2017, ICBC’s outstanding loan for SMEs, agriculture-related purposes and targeted poverty alleviation stood at RMB 2,089.9 billion, RMB1 ,900 billion and RMB 100 billion respectively, leading among peers.

With the establishment of Inclusive Finance Department, ICBC will put in place six independent mechanisms to meet various demands, including (I) independent credit management system to set independent credit program and independent credit management policies for SME financing; (II) independent capital management mechanism to set independent capital measurement, allocation and assessment rules; (III) independent accounting system to gradually establish and improve financial statement system for SME financing; (IV) independent risk provision and write-off mechanism to set differentiated risk tolerance and execute differentiated write-off policies; (V) independent fund balance and operation mechanism to decide special fund programs and integrate them into ICBC’s unified management over asset and liability business; (VI) independent assessment, incentive and restraint mechanism to set differentiated assessment and accountability rules and carry out double-line appraisal on inclusive finance departments of branches and sub-branches.

An official with ICBC said that the Bank will integrate the concept of inclusive finance into the culture of the Bank and put it into practice by establishing the six independent mechanisms. In addition, ICBC will try to establish around 300 professional service centers in two or three years to conduct financial business for SMEs, agriculture related areas as well as poverty alleviation with the help of professional teams and efficient services.