BNP Paribas Fortis was crowned winner of the “F*ck the Future Award'' in Ghent on Sunday, hosted by the Move your Money initiative, a cooperation of the Hart boven Hard citizens movement and NGO Faifin.
The groups labelled the bank as the most polluting bank in the country, in reference to its involvement in the German lignite mining village of Lützerath, which was evacuated ahead of its scheduled destruction earlier this year. The move to destroy the village, and Germany’s move back to coal mining, led to mass protests by environmental campaigners.
The organisers of the award singled out the bank for “doing everything possible to jeopardise our future.”
“BNP Paribas (parent company of BNP Paribas Fortis) is wiping the German village of Lützerath from the map to extract lignite there. The bank loaned $290 million to the company behind this project in 2022,” explained Janne Delagrange of Move Your Money in a press release.
The environmental groups ranked Deutsche Bank in second and ING as third in its ranking of non-eco-friendly financial institutions in Belgium. Belfius and KBC also received nominations.
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With their Move Your Money awareness campaign, Hart boven Hard and Fiarfin say that they want to draw attention to the fact that big banks are continuing to invest into fossil fuels. The campaign encourages customers to switch to more responsible banks.
