Critical Evaluation of Environmental, Social and Governance Disclosures of Malaysian Property and Construction Companies

There is an increasing demand from stakeholders for higher transparency on environmental, social and governance (ESG) disclosures. Yet not much is known about the state of sustainability reporting in Malaysia especially in the property and construction industry. This paper aims to fill this gap accordingly. Content analysis of corporate websites, sustainability and annual reports was adopted as the main methodology in this study. Findings show that corporate governance indicators are most reported by Malaysian construction companies compared to other environmental or social indicators. It was also found that details on actual health and safety performance of these companies and the initiatives implemented were largely absent from their reporting. Given the increasing number of rating tools in the capital markets which serve to rank and file companies based on their sustainability disclosures and performance such as the Dow Jones Sustainability Index (DJSI) and FTSE4Good Index, it is questionable as to how reliable this can be done for the Malaysian property and construction market. The paper will be useful to construction management practitioners and ESG analysts with a focus on Asian markets

Human resource management in the construction industry – Sustainability competencies

While environmental sustainability has been the subject of much debate in the last decade, it was not until recently that attention started to shift towards human resource management as an enabler for sustainability.  Yet, this is still a relatively under researched area.  Much is still unknown about the role of an individual worker in contributing towards sustainable development.  This paper addresses the gap by proposing a framework to measure sustainability competencies of employees within the construction industry sector.  As part of the framework, four proficiency levels together with relevant descriptions are defined for a total of eight sustainability competencies.  Suggested proficiency levels are then mapped to main construction related jobs based on the framework.  An example is also given to illustrate the manner in which competencies should be assessed.  This framework is original and of practical use to construction managers and human resource practitioners

A Review of Sustainability Reporting Tools (SRTs) for Communities

Sustainability reporting tools (SRTs) for Communities is part of a new paradigm to aid local governments and councils in their decision making process.  These integrative tools have evolved from prior versions of SRTs that focus purely on a single building performance to consider the sustainability performance of communities.  This paper provides a review of mainstream SRTs for Communities, in particular: BREEAM for Communities; LEED for Neighbourhood Development; CASBEE for Urban Development; Green Star for Communities; Sustainability Tool for Assessing and Rating (STAR); EcoCity; and HQE2R.  A critique of these tools is provided to better understand some of the existing limitations including the lack of clarity in the size of development that these SRTs are capable of assessing; lack of published reasoning behind the allocated scores or weightings for the criteria selected; inadequate account of the different sources of uncertainty; the adoption of a static perspective; and the lack of acknowledgement of possible interaction or correlation between criteria.  This review will be of interest to practitioners, academics and developers who are concerned about ways to improve the sustainability of the built environment

Human resource management in the construction industry – Sustainability competencies

While environmental sustainability has been the subject of much debate in the last decade, it was not until recently that attention started to shift towards human resource management as an enabler for sustainability.  Yet, this is still a relatively under researched area.  Much is still unknown about the role of an individual worker in contributing towards sustainable development.  This paper addresses the gap by proposing a framework to measure sustainability competencies of employees within the construction industry sector.  As part of the framework, four proficiency levels together with relevant descriptions are defined for a total of eight sustainability competencies.  Suggested proficiency levels are then mapped to main construction related jobs based on the framework.  An example is also given to illustrate the manner in which competencies should be assessed.  This framework is original and of practical use to construction managers and human resource practitioners.</p

Critical Evaluation of Environmental, Social and Governance Disclosures of Malaysian Property and Construction Companies

There is an increasing demand from stakeholders for higher transparency on environmental, social and governance (ESG) disclosures. Yet not much is known about the state of sustainability reporting in Malaysia especially in the property and construction industry. This paper aims to fill this gap accordingly. Content analysis of corporate websites, sustainability and annual reports was adopted as the main methodology in this study. Findings show that corporate governance indicators are most reported by Malaysian construction companies compared to other environmental or social indicators. It was also found that details on actual health and safety performance of these companies and the initiatives implemented were largely absent from their reporting. Given the increasing number of rating tools in the capital markets which serve to rank and file companies based on their sustainability disclosures and performance such as the Dow Jones Sustainability Index (DJSI) and FTSE4Good Index, it is questionable as to how reliable this can be done for the Malaysian property and construction market. The paper will be useful to construction management practitioners and ESG analysts with a focus on Asian markets