Social Responsibility

NLB is an integral part of the environment in which it works. NLB identifies with local communities and is actively involved in community affairs through its funding activities and philanthropic donations. In 2007, the Bank sponsored over 800 projects that demonstrated its social consciousness. It carefully selects and enthusiastically supports sports, cultural and charitable events that eloquently express the national character.

Sports: In 2007, for the second consecutive year, the NLB Group was the general sponsor of the regional basketball league, the NLB League. Competition began in 2001 and 14 clubs from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Slovenia, Serbia and Montenegro participate. Basketball is one of the most loved sports in these countries. The NLB League is the region’s largest sports project. It produces topnotch basketball players; many go on to compete with major European clubs or in the NBA, the American professional league. The NLB League brings together teams from countries that represent NLB Group’s target markets. The NLB League and NLB Group also share something else that is bringing them success: ambitious goals, excellent results and consistent growth.

By supporting top athletes and teams representing Slovenia, the Bank makes an important contribution to the success of Slovenian sports in general. Among the Bank’s major projects is its long-term role as golden sponsor and partner of the Slovenian Men and Women’s Alpine Skiing Teams. Slovenes consider themselves a skiing nation and naturally, skiing is the largest spectator sport in Slovenia.

There is no recreation without sport. In recent years, interest in running and biking has increased dramatically in Slovenia. The NLB cooperates and works with recreational sports organizers throughout Slovenia. Many employees belong to teams that regularly participate in various competitions.

Culture: As a result of its longstanding collaboration, the Bank has become an important partner of the Ljubljana Jazz Festival, which celebrated its 47th anniversary. The three-day festival features top jazz performers whose concerts regularly fill the halls of Cankarjev Dom in Ljubljana. Numerous other events and exhibitions accompany the festival, including the exhibit in our NLB Gallery Hall.

Imago Sloveniae was founded in 1994 to enliven and reinvigorate old city centers. Cultural performances in old town centers highlight the beauty of ancient squares, castles, museums, churches and other treasures that represent the Slovenian cultural heritage. The Bank has supported this project since 2000. In 2007, 30 cities and towns participated in the program by hosting renowned national and international classical musicians, who during the summer performed at over 100 concerts.

NLB has collaborated with the Ljubljana Festival for over 10 years. This summer cultural festival is the most important event in the nation’s capital and draws many tourists. The two-month long festival presents over 70 concerts and performances.

Every large Slovenian town presents numerous cultural offerings, and the NLB collaborates with nearly every event where it operates. In 2007, the Bank sponsored over 70 cultural events, organizations and institutions.

For decades, the Bank has been assembling its own Art Collection with the aim of preserving the Slovenian cultural identity. The long-term goal of the Bank is to build one of the most representative collections of prominent Slovenian artists of the 20th and 21st century. An expert commission expands the collection every year by recommending key additions. This makes the collection not only a sound investment in art but also in the Slovenian heritage, which in a time of globalization, is of special importance for the Slovenian nation. By purchasing works by eminent Slovenian artists, NLB preserves, develops and promotes Slovenian fine arts. As the NLB Group expands into foreign markets, it will also progressively expand its collection to include the works of artists from these regions.

Some of the art from the collection help furnish NLB Group offices throughout Slovenia. At times, the works are displayed in the NLB Gallery Hall, the galleries of regional centers and abroad. Part of the collection was also on exhibition in the Obalna Galerija Piran, Umetnostna Galerija Maribor, and regional galleries in the Gorizia province, Italy. During the Slovenian EU presidency in the first half of 2008, a part of the collection is exhibited in the gallery of the Brussels town hall.

Many of the artworks the Bank has collected over the decades, as well as those it has recently acquired, are considered the very summit of Slovenian artistic expression. The Bank is proud of the interest and appreciation that the artistic community has for the works in its collection. This not only confirms that the collection includes truly important Slovenian works of art, but also, together with the collections of other museums and galleries, contributes considerably to the national art endowment and the preservation of the cultural heritage of Slovenia. In the NLB Gallery Hall with its 37- year tradition, visitors can see and admire, for the eighth consecutive year running, works that capture the latest trends and movements in the visual arts from Slovenia, Europe and America.

Charities: NLB cooperates with over 200 different charitable organizations in all the regions where it operates. Among the largest and most longstanding are UNICEF Slovenia, and Karitas. Every year the NLB also makes donations to purchase equipment for many hospitals. For the past five years in an effort to help raise health awareness, NLB, together with Društvo za Zdravje Srca in Ožilja Slovenije (Heart Association Slovenia), has sponsored blood pressure, cholesterol and glucose testing with over 10,000 participating each year.