CDP Suggests Robust Climate Transition Plans Are Crucial

The key highlights of the aforementioned developments follow:

• CDP and SEC Thailand will collaborate throughout 2022 to raise awareness of and drive higher levels of environmental disclosures in Thailand, in line with the recommendations from the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD). The collaboration with CDP, which runs the global TCFD-aligned environmental disclosure system, and the SEC will involve co-developing a program to improve the quantity and quality of environmental disclosures from corporates and financial institutions in Thailand and the provision of data and insights from CDP to the SEC and other policy actors to support the priorities laid out in the Sustainable Finance Initiatives for Thailand roadmap. It will also involve a series of practical workshops and reports for corporates and policy makers to drive greater alignment with TCFD-aligned disclosures in Thailand.
• CDP collaborated with the Italian Ministry of Ecological Transition and published a report “Ready, Set, Act,," which analyzes environmental trends among Italian companies, governmental bodies, cities, and regions on issues related to climate, forest, biodiversity, and water security. The report findings show that there was a significant increase of 42% in corporate transparency in 2021, including a 55% increase in companies reporting climate data, a 40% increase in forest data, 24% on water security, and 22% by cities. The report highlighted that, in 2021, 6 Italian companies and 2 Italian cities received the best "A" score for environmental performance through CDP while 40% of Italian companies and 22 local governments have set emissions reduction targets, with fast growth in science-based target-setting, particularly in energy-intensive sectors. The report further shows that there is a strong need to increase the availability of public data on cities and regions in the south, most affected by the climate crisis.
• The CDP Europe Workshop 2022 covered areas related to net-zero targets, EU Taxonomy, new biodiversity reporting, and climate transition planning. One key takeaway was that robust climate transition plans are a crucial part of a company's journey. Plans must be time-bound and clearly outline how an organization will pivot its existing assets, operations, and entire business model toward a trajectory that aligns with 1.5°C. However, much is to be done, as CDP analysis suggests only 1% of global businesses currently disclose against all 24 of the recommended indicators. CDP is also evolving to integrate the EU taxonomy and the updated European mandatory reporting requirements in its disclosure system. Another message that came out strongly was that businesses need to be ready, now, and disclosing through CDP enables companies to meet new regulatory rules and ensure that business is ready to lead.

Keywords: International, Thailand, Italy, EU, Banking, Securities, ESG, Climate Change Risk, Disclosures, TCFD, Sustainable Finance, Transition Risk, Reporting, SEC Thailand, UNFCCC, CDP