Foreword by the Management Board
Responsibility, drive, consistency, innovation, and appreciation: These are our five corporate values. They were developed and defined by our employees in the past financial year. Every one of us at Rentenbank is expected to demonstrate these values in our day-to-day work.
2024 was a challenging year. The German economy contracted for the second year in a row. Companies in many sectors, but especially agriculture, are holding back on capital expenditures. Nevertheless, farmers do want to invest in projects to boost their competitiveness and make them fit for the future. And for that, they need planning certainty and a positive future outlook. They also need a strong financing partner like Rentenbank at their side. That is our responsibility.
We actively support the agricultural sector with our portfolio of promotional programmes, which we extended in 2024 to better meet the needs of farmers and people living in rural areas. For example, we added two new areas to our “Areas of Future Development“ programme. Together with the German Federal Environment Ministry, we launched the new grant programme “Promotion of Investment in Machinery and Equipment to Strengthen Natural Soil Functions in Agricultural Landscapes” as part of the Natural Climate Protection Action Programme (Aktionsprogramm Natürlicher Klimaschutz, ANK) and stepped up our efforts to promote innovation in agriculture.
Besides extending our promotional programmes, we also brought our expertise and extensive network of contacts to bear, combining the qualities of innovation and consistency, to help farmers devise practical solutions to complex challenges. We want agricultural enterprises to run their businesses successfully while also making themselves fit for the future. To that end, we formulated our first-ever Climate Strategy to put the bank in a position to help agricultural enterprises achieve the necessary emission reductions without sacrificing profitability. After all, profitable operation is a key prerequisite for maintaining access to credit.
Communicating actively with farmers and other stakeholders both within and outside of the agribusiness and food sector enables us to identify needs and develop solutions in cooperation with them. This kind of intensive dialogue also aids mutual understanding, promotes appreciation for the work of the agricultural sector, and generally strengthens the agribusiness eco-system.
As we strive to make the agricultural sector fit for the future, we must do the same for ourselves. To this end, we achieved several targets we set for ourselves in 2024 by making great progress in modernising our IT systems and introducing modern AI tools, among other things. We are undertaking these efforts to ensure that we can continue to be a strong and effective partner to the highly diverse sector we serve. Rentenbank’s solid financial ratios put us in an excellent position to take all the necessary steps to make us fit for the future amidst a generally challenging environment.
The agriculture sector’s will to succeed, the good relationship and close cooperation between us and the members of this sector, and our continuous efforts to improve our own performance are all good reasons to be confident as we begin the new year 2025.
Together with the employees we are working hard to master the challenges we face and fulfil our corporate purpose “We help create a sustainable future for agriculture” – with responsibility, drive, consistency, innovation, and appreciation.