The main actions to help people prosper will consist of the support for child education, contribution to social welfare, and protection and dissemination of art and culture.

Madrid, 18 December 2019

Banco Santander, as a responsible bank, has undertaken to help 4 million people by 2021. This is part of its commitment to help people, businesses and society prosper in every country in which it operates. 

The bank will be able to meet the goal it has set through several actions it is promoting, mainly in three areas: its commitment to child education, support for programmes in various countries to guarantee equal opportunities for all children and sustainable development; support for social welfare, through initiatives to address poverty, vulnerability and social exclusion, including programmes focused on disease prevention, health promotion and support for people with disabilities; and protecting and disseminating culture, primarily through Fundación Banco Santander, in Spain, and Santander Cultural, in Brazil. This is in addition to the support of more than 60,000 employees who take part in the bank’s various social initiatives. 

Since 2002, Santander has invested a total of €669 million in these initiatives – in 2018 alone 58 were undertaken, a 7% increase over 2017 and nearly 11% more than in 2016: 

• 600,000 children received assistance through programmes to support education, encouraging students to stay in school and improving the quality of basic education. This was a 31% year-on-year increase.
  
• Over 1 million people were helped through programmes designed to address social exclusion, almost 43% more than in 2017.
• In addition, more than 1 million people benefited from Fundación Banco Santander and Santander Cultural’s cultural and scientific sponsorship initiatives.

Through these community support programmes, the bank directly contributes to the achievement of several of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, including reducing poverty (SDG 1), promoting health and social well-being (SDG 3), supporting quality education (SDG 4), and reducing inequality (SDG 10).

The goal of helping 4 million people in 2021 is part of the 10 responsible banking commitments that the bank launched in July of this year, which also include the goals of financially empowering 10 million people between 2019 and 2025 and financing 200,000 scholarships, internships and entrepreneur programmes between 2019 and 2021.

In 2019, Santander was recognised as the world’s most sustainable bank by Dow Jones Sustainability Index (DJSI). It has also been listed on the FTSE4Good IBEX Index since 2003, given that it works for environmental sustainability, the development of positive relations with stakeholders and the support and preservation of universal human rights.