Unicaja and the Asturian Federation of Business Owners (FADE) have organized a conference entitled 'The future of sustainable mobility', which was held on Wednesday at the headquarters of FADE in Oviedo. This is the third event of a cycle that, within the framework of the collaboration agreement between both institutions, aims to offer training to business owners and freelancers to contribute to the improvement of the competitiveness of Asturian companies, under a sustainability strategy.
Unicaja’s regional manager of Business Banking, José Marcos Fernández, and the head of the Business Development Area of FADE, Leticia Bilbao, presented this conference, which has provided the keys to move towards sustainable mobility, reflecting on the future of mobility in Asturias, as well as on the role that companies should adopt within the new scenario that they are facing.
José Marcos Fernández thanked FADE for its commitment to inform Asturian business owners about the most interesting and current issues and stressed that "Unicaja faces the challenge of sustainability as an opportunity for development and improvement of our daily activity, working on a renewed offer of products and services, and on the reduction of our carbon footprint".
The head of FADE's Business Development Area, Leticia Bilbao, emphasized during the conference that "sustainable mobility has enormous economic and employment potential for companies, and must be understood as another element of their competitiveness and differentiation".
These issues were discussed with the participation of the Director General of Transport of the Government of Asturias, Arantza Fernández; the technical manager of the Business Association for the Development and Promotion of Electric Mobility (AEDIVE), Javier Izquierdo; the president of the Automobile Association of Principado de Asturias (ASPA), Miguel Pérez, and the head of Logistics and Supply of Hijos de Luis Rodríguez (Masymas), Rubén Montes.
In the different interventions of the round table, it has become clear that sustainable mobility is one of the elements that is currently marking much of the political agendas from the local to the international level, and that it encompasses a great economic, labor and competitiveness potential, which is already affecting companies.
The 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) represent the international commitment to address social, economic and environmental challenges. Within the thematic diversity encompassed by the SDGs, there are factors such as sustainable mobility, which have a cross-cutting impact on several goals and, therefore, can act as drivers to advance the achievement of the 2030 Agenda.
Boost to sustainable mobility
Sustainable and connected mobility harbors enormous economic, employment and competitiveness potential that affects a new urban and metropolitan mobility, the industrial value chain, decarbonization, the circular economy and digitalization.
In that line, Unicaja contributes specifically to this end, to help its customers in this transition, with the Ecomobility Loan to finance sustainable cars, both new and pre-owned or second-hand, as well as electric recharging points. A 'green' loan that is part of a wide range of financial products and services that the bank makes available to its customers.
In general, the development and promotion of renewable energy sources, as well as the promotion of measures to improve energy efficiency are priority objectives for the company.
Likewise, the support of events such as the one developed in collaboration with FADE also responds to Unicaja's interest in favoring the activity of the business fabric and facilitating the economic boost in the areas where it operates in general, and in this specific case, in Asturias, one of its regions of origin.
FADE represents and defends the general interests of companies and freelancers in Asturias. It is currently made up of 81 business associations, which include more than 50,000 companies.
