Tuesday 15 March 2022

Companies worth $105tn called on to disclose environmental impact

More than 10,000 companies, worth a combined total of $105 trillion (£80.4tn), have been asked to disclose their environmental impact by 680 financial institutions.

These financial institutes have $130 trillion (£99.6tn) worth of assets and include Allianz, BNP Paribas and AXA.

That’s according to CDP, which has helped to send letters to these 10,000 companies on their behalf requesting this information.

Any measures that mitigate climate change, deforestation and water security will be divulged.

CDP has revealed that a heavy shift has been witnessed in the last year, with 3,200 companies out of the 7,100 asked, disclosed their environmental data. This is in addition, to the 10,000 companies that used its platform already – meaning a 64% share of global market capitalisation disclosed data.

It claims that 4,000 companies refused to disclose data last year and stresses that there is still much work to do to instigate change.

However, it states that non-disclosure will now become far more difficult for companies, as measures are being implemented across the UK, EU, Japan, New Zealand and India this year to make this a requirement by law.

CEO, Paul Simpson, said: “While many companies are disclosing, setting targets and taking action across their own business operations and value chains, there is a surprisingly large part of the market still to take the vital first step of disclosure.

“These companies are becoming increasingly out of touch with reality, investor and public opinion, not just because of the regulatory stick that is approaching but also because there are so many proven benefits to transparency.

“We hope that this request, backed by such an influential group of financial institutions worldwide, will hit home and drive transparency and action even further.”