Reporting on what matters - and more

NOTWITHSTANDING the laborious process involved in creating an annual report, some Singapore-listed companies have gone beyond mere compliance and enhanced the quality of their disclosures, touching on issues close to the hearts of their stakeholders through sustainability reporting.

Engineering firm ST Engineering, for instance, produced a standalone sustainability report in 2014 in accordance with the Global Reporting Initiatives (GRI) guidelines. It focused on issues that affected its business and how it identified significant business risks through its enterprise risk management (ERM) process.

But the company's journey to drive business sustainability started as early as 2007, with actions taken and data tracked being reviewed internally on a regularly basis and these have been disclosed in its annual reports.