KPMG: Global corporate reporting needs to top up on Water Scarcity

By Rob Starr, Content Manager, Big4.com

KPMG International’s latest Sustainable Insight reveals that the majority of the world’s largest companies lack a long term water strategy. Wim Bartels, KPMG’s Global Head of Sustainability Assurance, said while the issue of water scarcity is rising in the public consciousness, many leading companies are not yet taking steps to reduce their water consumption and will likely experience increasing public or investor pressure to do so.

The results vary by country. Of those that produce a CR report, 95 percent of Indian companies, 69 percent of Spanish companies and 66 percent of UK companies include specific plans to reduce water usage. This contrasts with just 24 percent of Chinese companies and 27 percent of Japan-based companies.

Sustainable Insight – Business Responses to Water Scarcity provides analysis of the corporate responsibility (CR) reports of the largest companies across 34 countries, including the world’s top 250 companies.

Lagging in the list of industries which report is the transportation sector where only half of the largest companies address water issues in their CR reports. The utilities sector also demonstrates comparatively low rates of reporting (the second lowest at 62 percent), which is somewhat surprising given the water intensity of power generation.