Central Bank of Cuba publishes proposal for Sustainable Finance and Innovation training to align banking with science and innovation policy

The Central Bank of Cuba has published an analytical paper by a specialist at the National Center for Banking Training (CNSB) on integrating national science, technology and innovation policy into the banking and financial system, and sets out a proposed interdisciplinary Sustainable Finance and Innovation (FSI) training programme to support that integration. The paper identifies three main gaps limiting the sector’s contribution to sustainable development: weak alignment between national science and innovation agendas and banking-specific needs, limited public and private investment in clean technologies applied to finance, and insufficient institutional integration between banks and the broader innovation ecosystem including universities, research centres and innovation agencies. The proposed FSI programme would build staff capabilities in areas such as green finance, climate risk assessment and responsible innovation governance, supported by partnerships with government science bodies, universities and environmental institutions for curricula, applied innovation labs and certification, and a digital open-knowledge platform compiling case studies, environmental performance indicators and good practices. As follow-on actions, the paper recommends promoting formal adoption of the FSI programme as a mandatory component of continuous training across the banking and financial system, establishing permanent working groups coordinated by the CNSB, and developing standardised metrics aligned to the Sustainable Development Goals and Cuba’s national science and innovation policy for integration into corporate reporting and institutional performance assessment.