Top Commitment

Mizuho Financial Group
President & CEO
Takashi Tsukamoto

The financial crisis originating in the United States has had a huge impact on the real economy, and caused a major deterioration in business conditions that has affected the entire world. Mizuho has not escaped the repercussions and its fiscal 2008 results were severely affected.

Given the business environment, I believe we should go back to The Mizuho Code of Conduct, which was drawn up in the spirit of the Basic Principles of the Consolidation when Mizuho was established. At the same time, we should continue to respect international initiatives such as the UN's "Principles for Responsible Investment" (PRI) and the UN Global Compact. In other words, I believe it is vital to recognize anew the importance of the financial institution's public mission and social responsibilities. I also believe that Mizuho's CSR (corporate social responsibility) lies in strengthening its business structure from the perspectives of corporate governance and compliance, achieving an earnings recovery while listening carefully to the opinions of our stakeholders, and proactively contributing to the realization of a sustainable society.

Making the most of its knowledge and know-how concerning its core business and its operational processes, Mizuho is engaged in tackling various social issues from a medium- to long-term perspective.

The first of these is the environment. Environmental problems such as global warming and climate change are important, highly topical issues that are discussed around the world. As a global, comprehensive financial services group, Mizuho believes it has a major role to play in this area through the mechanisms of finance.

Since it became the first Japanese bank to adopt the Equator Principles in 2003, Mizuho has taken a proactive stance on wind power generation and other environment-related project finance deals. In doing so, it has set parameters that study loan conditions from the perspective of their impact on the regional environments and societies of the regions under development. It channels considerable effort into business matching based on environmentally conscious finance, the environment itself and related themes aimed at companies that are introducing energy-conserving facilities. It also supports emissions trading and promotes the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM).

In order to reduce the environmental impact of our own business activities, the entire group is working to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and meet the other environmental targets we have set.

The second issue we are working on is financial education. Our efforts in this area cover the appropriate use of financial services, the avoidance of multiple indebtedness and financial crime prevention. But they go beyond this to take a broader look at the importance of "credit" as the foundations of society, and the fostering of a sense of morality and work values.

These efforts have been energetic and multifaceted. At the elementary and secondary school levels, we have prepared textbooks and guidelines for teachers on the basis of joint research with Tokyo Gakugei University since fiscal 2006. We have also arranged for bank staff to give lessons at schools, and for students to visit the bank to gain some workplace experience.

At the higher education level, we have arranged for current employees of Mizuho group companies to give lectures and courses at universities. In this way, we are nurturing "human resources with high-level financial knowledge" through the kind of practical lessons that only a comprehensive financial group can offer.

During fiscal 2008, we put considerable effort into responding to society's demands from the perspectives of facilitating corporate finance amidst the sudden economic slowdown, and preventing financial@crime- an area of growing interest among clients.

In the area of corporate finance, we take the financial institution's role of ensuring a smooth supply of funds very seriously. In addition to providing speedy and meticulous responses to funding demand, we have created an organization that can offer a broad range of solutions in connection with clients' business strategies.

In the area of financial crime prevention, we have devised various countermeasures to protect our clients' precious assets and help them to live safe and secure lives. We have also adopted initiatives to help those who are unfortunate enough to suffer damages.

Developing human resources is an important management issue when it comes to pursuing these initiatives.

One of Mizuho's strengths is a business model that allows highly specialized employees to cooperate with each other within their companies as they go about their work. Mizuho is channeling its efforts into strengthening and promoting the development and utilization of human resources so that they can work with clients in overcoming the severe economic environment and enhance their enterprise value over the medium to long term.

Given the severity of today's economic conditions and the management environment, I believe it is essential for me as the CEO to take the lead in demonstrating the stance we should adopt in order to fulfill our corporate social responsibilities. In carrying out my daily management activities, I always strive to be "customer-oriented," "frontline-oriented," and "future-minded," and seize every opportunity to stress their importance within the company.

Being "customer-oriented" means to look at everything from the client's perspective. Being "frontline-oriented" means to channel the maximum possible management resources into the client business activities so as to be able to satisfy clients' needs quickly. And being "future-minded" means offering products and services that will help raise clients' enterprise value in the future.

As they go about their duties, I believe all employees should be strongly aware at all times that they are supported by our clients. In this way, we can ensure that we continue to be a financial institution that has both "trust" and "presence" at home and overseas.

We look forward to your continuing understanding and support in these endeavors.