Almost half of finance leaders admit scant reporting on ESG

More than a third said that they find environmental impact the hardest to report about.

Almost half or 45% of finance leaders for large companies in Singapore believe that their companies are not doing enough to disclose their environmental, social and governance (ESG) metrics, according to a report by cloud applications provider Workday. This is despite 83% of companies producing triple bottom line (TBL) reports.

The report further finds that 20% of finance leaders are dissatisfied with their current internal ESG reporting systems, with 39% finding the environmental impact most difficult to report on. This is followed by social impact at 34%, and governance at 28%. About 2% of the respondents also admitted that they intend to invest time and resources into improving this area in the coming 12 months.

Meanwhile, 84% of finance leaders in Singapore believe TBL reporting is important, whilst only 27% say it should not be mandatory for any company.

In addition, 76% of respondents say TBL reporting is more important for multinational companies compared to its local counterparts.Fifty-three percent of finance leaders see manufacturing as the most crucial industry for TBL reporting, followed by finance at 39%, and transport & logistics with 35%. Retail, and travel & tourism ranked lowest, with 18% and 17%, respectively.

Presently, TBL reporting is not a regulatory requirement, which makes it the biggest barrier in securing wider adoption with 23%. With this, lack of both resources and support from internal stakeholders follows with 21% and 19%, respectively. Other barriers include the general public not seeing TBL as important at 13% and the costing of reports for companies at 10%.