A pharmacist turned seasoned banker, Pipit Aneaknithi has been appointed as KASIKORNBANK's President since January 2017. With over 20 years of experience in banking industry and his mastery, he is the one who introduced a medicinal-related solution to restore Nan province’s pristine headwater forest. Joining KASIKORNBANK in the middle of Asian Financial Crisis in 1990s, Mr. Aneaknithi has played an instrumental role in a series of the bank's post-crisis organization transformations, and, currently, is in the forefront of the re-formation of bank-wide digital strategy. Furthermore, as KASIKORNBANK have determined to be the leader in ESG among banks in Southeast Asia, they have reconceptualized their strategic imperatives, enabling themselves to become net-zero in their own operations by 2030; in which Mr. Aneaknithi is one of the spearheading leaders on the decarbonization journey of KASIKORNBANK and piloting beyond-banking ESG initiatives in the bank’s ecosystem. Following the aspiration of Mr. Lamsam, Chairman Emeritus of KASIKORNBANK, to restore Nan forest, Mr. Aneaknithi has been leveraging his expertise in the world of capitalism, together with the knowledge in pharmaceutical science, to intensify possible and sustainable solutions to the deforestation from the ground up. On one hand, through the lens of banker, he saw a misfit situation of Thai economy which excessively relies on the low-value carbohydrate agriculture; especially in Nan Province where these cash crops come at the expense of forest’s health and villagers’ well-being. On the other hand, through the lens of pharmacist, he recognized the hidden gems of the forest, Natural Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (NAPI). With much higher value than the deforesting cash crops, medicinal plants, a Non-Timber Forest Product (NTFP) and the source of NAPI, can be the answer to the equation. Bringing it all together, Mr. Aneaknithi formulated a strategy to create the ‘end-to-end value chain’ of medicines from plants as a ‘game changer’ to solve cohabitating issues between people and forest, the problem of which has been deeply rooted and leading to relentless deforestation. He wholeheartedly believes that medicines from plants will become a true potential Nature-Based Solution to Nan forest restoration. Subsequently, in order to execute the proposed strategy, Mr. Lamsam established K Agro-innovate Institution (KAI), under KASIKORNTHAI Foundation, in 2021 which Mr. Aneaknithi, as a steering committee, had helped laying the groundworks for the institute. With KASIKORNBANK as a parent entity, KAI has access to industry’s insight, network to key players, and source of funding to bring about the success in saving Nan, the pristine headwater forest of the world. Thus far, KAI has already funded numbers of medicinal researches, carried out a series of forestry experiment, and connected the dots along the value chain to create a proof of concept on this strategy. From zero to one, KAI is now on the path to create an example that forest and people can live healthily and harmoniously together. Mr. Aneaknithi received his Bachelor’s Degree in Pharmacy from Chiang Mai University, Thailand; his MBA from FH Pforzheim in Germany and University of Brighton in the United Kingdom. In addition, currently, he is serving as Chairman of the Board of KBank (China), as well as KASIKORN Securities Plc.