With the increased focus on sustainability, we recognise that for our business to be sustainable in the future, we need to grow our social capital and preserve environmental capital, while not deviating from our core business objective: to provide shareholders with a sound return on their investment.

With this in mind, we are pleased to present our third sustainability report, covering the year ending 31 December 2004. The aim of the report is to convey to all stakeholders what we are currently doing to ensure the future sustainability of the group and what our plans are going forward. This report follows a similar format to previous years and is guided by the criteria in the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) Sustainability Guidelines. We have included our International operations for the first time this year, making this our first global sustainability report.

As this report will reveal, we achieved good progress during 2004 though we acknowledge that there is still much work ahead to integrate and evolve the principles and practices of sustainable development. Our future challenges aside, the group’s directors and employees have worked diligently over the last few years to lay the foundations we need to ensure our long-term sustainability as a growth-focused financial services organisation.

In the wider context of striving to build a just, free and prosperous South African society in the aftermath of apartheid, such challenges also entail the drive to promote socioeconomic transformation and greater opportunities for black people. Hence our commitment to promoting black economic empowerment (BEE) and meeting our Financial Sector Charter (charter) targets in the next few years.

One of our successes during 2004 was the implementation of our Black Ownership Initiative. We consider this initiative an essential element of our BEE strategy. We believe that meaningful participation by black people in the mainstream economy is essential to sustaining South Africa’s successful economic and democratic structures.

Stakeholder feedback is important for us, not only to continually improve our report, but as an opportunity for all our stakeholders to provide us with input on any sustainability issues or other concerns you may have. We encourage you to provide us with feedback by either completing the form here or electronically on our website at www.standardbank.co.za.

This report’s executive summary encapsulates just a few of our sustainable development highlights of 2004 and sets the tone for what I consider to be a year of encouraging progress. I trust you will enjoy reading this report.