Rapheal Mun named Citi APAC’s Sustainability Head; just as Asia becomes hotter for green finance jobs

Rapheal Mun has been appointed Citi APAC’s new Head of Sustainability & Corporate Transitions (SCT) for the Banking, Capital Markets and Advisory (BCMA) group, a newly created role. She will be responsible for driving the BCMA group’s sustainability and building its ESG strategy, as well as leading client engagement in the region. According to the announcement last Friday, her role will involve collaborating with sector, country and product teams to efficiently engage in meaningful sustainability based discussions with clients. She will be entrusted to expand business opportunities that manifest during this period of global transition towards more sustainable business practices and the evolution to a net-zero emissions economy.

Mun will report to Jan Metzger, Head of APAC BCMA, and also to Keith Tuffley, Co-Head of Citi’s SCT team and Amol Gupte, Citi Country Officer Singapore. She will be relocating to London for this role.

She is a seasoned financial leader with over 19 years’ experience across structured finance, infrastructure, power, energy and real estate. She is currently serving as a senior banker in EMEA Project & Infrastructure Finance. 

Mun's appointment comes at a time when Citi has already raised over US$30 billion in sustainable financing for Asian clients just in 2021 to date. Since the COVID crisis started, ESG related funds have consistently hit upper circuits throughout the first quarter, and institutions across the banking and financial sector - which have gradually been moving in the direction of sustainable investment over the last decade - have also stepped up their activity in 'green finance'. In Asia alone, ESG debt issuance has already tripled in 2021 and the ESG sector will see around 30 million jobs by 2030. 

Notably, the boom in ESG finance and green banking has also led to a rise in the demand for sustainability talent. The growing investment in ESG Credit across Asia has fuelled the need for qualified staff even though there is a dearth of expert professionals in this field.

Arthur Leung, a financial services consultant at Hongkong-based leadership advisory firm Egon Zehnder, said that clients do understand the scarcity of talent.  Talent with a proven track record and relevant ESG experience in both private and public sectors is rare. He also added that they are highly motivated to pay for these ESG roles. For example, the demand for ESG talent is so high in Japan that a person in an ESG role can earn as much as 20 million yen in base salary, compared to less than 10 million yen in a non-ESG role.