It's a bit of a gift to an investigation of big companies' records on climate change and the environment that the first company on Cloud Citizen's Sydney corporate watch list should be both the nation's biggest insurer and a provider of "sustainable" investment services - but be unable to boast its own sustainability report or, for that matter, a demonstrable link from its web site to a current, certified environmental management system.
Such undertakings are fundamental in demonstrating a corporate commitment to our common environmental good, and when we go searching for evidence of such a major company's undertakings on the environment, we are serious about wanting to find some. We can only be extremely disappointed, then, when they add up to nothing more than a fig leaf.
But get this, because this really is a matter of the most splendid irony.
AMP Capital Investors' Ian Wood, its senior research analyst for its Sustainable Alpha Fund - that's the sustainable investments arm of this investment giant - was a judge on the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) Australia And New Zealand Sustainability Reporting Awards, 2008. The link is here.
Here's the question. If AMP is happy enough to lend Ian Wood out to judge the sustainability reports of others, why has it not got its own sustainability reporting house in order? Does this not seem somewhat hypocritical?
Look at Wood's credentials:
Dr Ian Woods
Dr Woods is the Senior Research Analyst for the AMP Capital Investors Sustainable Alpha Fund. Ian’s prime role is to the assess the management of intangible assets of companies on the Australian Stock Exchange through the assessment of environmental, social and governance (EAG) issues and in engaging with these companies in the areas of corporate social responsibility and sustainability.
Ian also undertakes assessment of greenhouse gas risk issues for the wider AMP Capital Investment teams and has undertaken a number of studies in this area. Since joining AMP Capital in December 2000, Ian has been instrumental in the further development of the Sustainable fund assessment process used to integrate ESG issues into the fund’s investment decision making. Ian’s particular focus has been in considering how the issues of sustainability and ESG relate to financial investment and the investment risks.
Ian’s background is in environmental and risk consulting both in Asia/Pacific region and Europe, working with most of the large companies Australia and the UK. He has a PhD in Chemical Engineering from the University of Sydney, a Masters of Environmental Law and recently finished an MBA at AGSM.
I've met Ian Wood and he seemed a decent enough bloke. But, if he is clever enough, and his intellect doesn't seem to be in doubt, could it not be better deployed in boosting AMP's own social sustainability profile, and perhaps its credibility on sustainability?
Update at October 2011:
Despite the fact this post was first written in February, 2010, a search on “sustainability report” at AMP’s site still doesn’t yield a document with these words in its title.
