The Wire

According to a new study by researchers at the University of Technology, Sydney, while most Australian companies in the top 100 now report on their environmental performance, there’s still a strong tendency to talk about the positive – and leave out the negative. Researchers decided to find out whether the mandatory corporate environmental reporting requirements, introduced in 1998, would have a significant effect on whether companies would take green issues more seriously. They analysed the directors’ reports of the top 100 Australian companies. Under Corporations Law, the annual Director’s Report must check off the company’s environmental obligations. Since this was introduced, companies have by and large improved their performance. In 1999 there were 29 who didn’t comply with environmental reporting, while in 2002, there were 10. The worst performers were Rio Tinto, Publishing and Broadcasting Limited (PBL), Argo Investments, Computershare, Lihir Mining, Foodland, Coal and Allied, A.X.A Australia Diversified Property Trust, Westfield America Trust and the Westfield Trust. Australia and Norway are the only countries in the world with a mandatory reporting requirement. But Australia doesn’t measure up so well, on a global scale. Cinnamon Nippard asked Karen Bubna-Litic, Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Law at the University of Technology Sydney, about how companies have understood their obligations to report their environmental performance in Australia.