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Asia’s Best Sustainability Report award goes to the report which provides a comprehensive, balanced, focused and coherent description of sustainability strategy, practices, performance and outcomes on issues that reflect the business’s most significant impacts on society and the environment and the interests and expectations of stakeholders. The best report will have a clear strategy, goals and targets and provide examples of practice to demonstrate what has been achieved so far, and outline plans to make continued progress. The company will also disclose where it has failed to meet objectives or addressed specific risks or challenges. The winning report will excel in providing an overall picture of the sustainability impacts of the company’s business and meaningful leadership commitment.

Reports submitted for this category should be standalone sustainability reports. A sustainability report combined with an annual report will not be considered for this category.

ASRA judges will focus on strategic approach to sustainability, meaningful and relevant leadership opening statement, stakeholder engagement, materiality disclosure, coverage of all significant impacts of the business, including challenges, and clear presentation of multi-year performance results.

Note: A report submitted for this category will not be accepted for the following categories: Asia’s Best Sustainability Report (Within Annual Report) and Asia’s Best Integrated Report.

This award goes to sustainability disclosures that are part of the organisation’s Annual Report – a “report within a report” or a combined report. Sustainability disclosure that will differentiate this company includes a comprehensive, focused and coherent description of sustainability strategy, practices, performance and outcomes on issues that reflect the business’s most significant impacts on society and the environment and the interests and expectations of stakeholders. Clear strategy, goals and targets, as well as examples of practice to demonstrate what has been achieved so far, and plans to make continued progress, are also important. The winning sustainability report will show a strategic link between the organisation’s business goals and its social and environmental goals.

ASRA judges will focus on strategic approach to sustainability, meaningful and relevant leadership opening statement, stakeholder engagement, materiality disclosure, coverage of all significant impacts of the business, including challenges, and clear presentation of multi-year performance results.

Note: A report submitted for this category will not be accepted for the following categories: Asia’s Best Integrated Report and Asia’s Best Sustainability Report (Standalone)

This award is for inaugural sustainability reports published during the qualifying period. The winning report will be a well-rounded report, demonstrating a long-term approach to integrating sustainability practice in the business in a way which is relevant for the company. The report should include material impacts, with a focus on the issues that show how the company is making a difference for its customers and stakeholders.

ASRA judges will focus on strategic approach to sustainability, meaningful and relevant leadership opening statement, coverage of all significant sustainability impacts of the business, approach to stakeholder engagement, and clear presentation of multi-year sustainability performance results.

The public sector agencies are welcome to submit their annual sustainability report, CSR report or a similar annual report for this category. The public sector agencies include government departments and agencies, declared authorities, state-owned corporations (wholly owned by the government), health services, local government and universities.

This category is for the Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) with less than $100 million in annual group-level revenue. The winning report will be a well-rounded report, demonstrating a long-term approach to integrating sustainability practice in the business in a way which is relevant for a smaller company. The report should include environmental and social impacts, with a focus on the issues that show how the company is making a difference for its customers and stakeholders.

ASRA judges will focus on the strategic approach to sustainability and disclosure of material topics, meaningful and relevant leadership opening statement, stakeholder engagement, coverage of baseline sustainability impacts of the business, and clear presentation of sustainability performance results.

Note: This category is for small and medium enterprises. SME subsidiaries of large corporations should not submit entries for this category.

The winning report would demonstrate the reporting organisation’s integrated thinking, decision-making, actions that focus on the creation of value and disclosures about matters that substantively affect the business’s ability to create value over the short, medium and long-term. The winning report is expected to clearly illustrate how it has applied the 7 guiding principles advocated by the International Integrated Reporting Council (IIRC) in its International <IR> Framework. Building on the Content Elements prescribed by the IIRC, the winning report would show how the organisation takes into account the connectivity and interdependencies between the range of factors or capitals that affect its ability to create value over time. The report should also provide insight into the nature and quality of the firm’s relationships with its key stakeholders the effects of its output on the three critical dimensions of sustainable development, the economy, environment and society.

ASRA judges will focus on how clearly the organisation describes its integrated approach to value creation, description of  its business strategy and outlook, a clear account of inputs and major outputs or outcomes, description of the relationship between the company and its stakeholders, identification of sustainability issues critical to the business of the company and description of material issues that substantively affect the organization’s ability to create value over the short, medium and long term.

Note: A report submitted for this category will not be accepted for the following categories: Asia’s Best Sustainability Report (Within Annual Report) and Asia’s Best Sustainability Report. Similarly, a report entered into Asia’s Best Sustainability Report (Within Annual Report) or Asia’s Best Sustainability Report will not be accepted for Asia’s Best Integrated Report category.

Organisations who have produced their first integrated report using the International <IR> Framework issued by the International Integrated Reporting Council (IIRC) and invited to submit their entry for this category. The winning report would demonstrate how it has used the IIRC’s concept of capitals, guiding principles and content elements to communicate its value creation story.

The evaluation criteria for this category is the same as Asia’s Best Integrated Report category.

Note: A report submitted for this category will not be accepted for the following categories: Asia’s Best Sustainability Report (Within Annual Report) and Asia’s Best Sustainability Report. Similarly, a report entered into Asia’s Best Sustainability Report (Within Annual Report) or Asia’s Best Sustainability Report will not be accepted for Asia’s Best Integrated Report category.

This award will go to a report which is efficiently presented in a digital format such as online reporting.  The winning entry will show how it has used innovative digital formats to present its sustainability data and performance beyond PDFs. Ideally, the reporting format represents a channel for direct stakeholder engagement on a website or a dedicated micro-site, rather than different sections placed within the corporate website. The report’s ability to enable stakeholder engagement through the online platform will be considered. Also, the frequency of updates and creative use of social media and videos will be taken into account.

ASRA judges will focus on coverage of all significant sustainability impacts of the business, clear, ideally interactive presentation of sustainability performance results, interactive possibilities with stakeholders, and easy navigation and effective online elements such as video and social media links.

This category is for recognising the best practice in materiality assessment and disclosure. The winning report demonstrates the due process in identifying and prioritising material impacts, why they are important and what the organisation is doing to address them: the report clearlydemonstrates an understanding of material impacts, risks and opportunities, and its strategies to deal with each of these.

ASRA judges will focus on details of process by which material impacts were defined and prioritised, description of organisation’s impacts on the environmental, society and economy across the value chain, description of influence of material impacts on stakeholder views and opinions, stakeholder engagement for identifying material impacts, application of industry-specific materiality frameworks and benchmarks, explanation of importance of material impacts, and performance in addressing material impacts.

The award of this category will go to the report which clearly demonstrates the organisation’s strategies, goals and objectives in engaging with key stakeholders and using the engagement to develop effective sustainability programmes. This organisation describes its framework for stakeholder engagement and provides evidence of real engagement with stakeholders.

ASRA judges will focus on process for identifying and prioritising stakeholders, strategies and approaches adopted for engaging critical stakeholders, goals and targets, methods for measuring the effectiveness of engagement,inclusion of stakeholder views in the report, how the organisation has used stakeholder engagement in identifying sustainability topics for reporting, and outcome of stakeholder engagement including successes and failures.

The category celebrates the leading edge in environmental reporting by comprehensively taking into account the most material ecological impacts of the reporting organisation. The winner demonstrates the strategic importance of its environmental initiatives to its business and its stakeholders, identifies specific environmental impacts and reports performance. Ideally, the report will disclose multi-year environmental targets and performance.

ASRA judges will focus on environmental strategy and management systems, description of environmental impacts, risks and opportunities, description of environmental practices, and description of environmental targets and performance.

The reporting organisation applies international standards and best practices for measuring, monitoring and reporting its GHG emissions. This award goes to the report which communicates an understanding of the impacts, risks and opportunities from climate change effectively, and engagement within the industry or national/regional efforts to mitigate climate change impacts. The report discloses targets, plans and strategies to transition to low-carbon operations including reduction and mitigation. Ideally, the report covers all Scope 1, 2 and 3 GHG emissions.

The organisation’s commitment to the Science-Based Targets, the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) recommendations and the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) will be considered.

ASRA judges will focus on carbon mitigation strategy and targets, detailed carbon footprint disclosure, description of carbon mitigation practices, and details of carbon mitigation performance across all Scopes.

This award is for the report that reflects all the elements of active employee engagement and responsible workplace undertaken by the company and how these contribute to business success in a strategic way. The report covers the full range of workplace impacts on employees including attraction, retention, training and development, compensation and benefits, safety, labour rights, occupational health and safety, labour and management relations, internal communications and employee engagement.

ASRA judges will focus on responsible workplace strategy and targets, description of workplace impacts on employees and the business, description of key practices, and performance results including employee surveys.

This award is for the best disclosure on organisational gender equality and diversity. It covers the way the organisation practices inclusive policies in all areas of diversity and inclusion and achieves results. This goes beyond a general statement of commitment and specifically shows how the organisation invests and encourages an inclusive and diverse culture with equal opportunity relating to gender, gender identity, socio-economic and cultural backgrounds, older employees, and any other relevant dimensions of diversity. It covers recruitment, development, pay, promotion, and mechanisms in place to advance diversity.

ASRA judges will focus on diversity and inclusion strategy and targets, description of diversity impacts on employees and on the business, description of key diversity and inclusion frameworks and practices and detailed performance results including pay and promotion equality.

This award is for the most transparent and comprehensive supply chain disclosure. The winning report describes its supply chain, critical impacts along the supply chain and ways in which the company is ensuring sustainable and ethical supply chain management. The best reports in this category will disclose specific steps taken to engage suppliers in ethical conduct and the results of social and environmental supplier assessments and interventions.

ASRA judges will focus on clear description of the supply chain, approach to sustainable procurement, the performance of suppliers against defined standards, and disclosure of measures taken to mitigate supply chain risk.

This award goes to the winner who provided a coherent account of its community investment, impacts and the difference made. The winning report will link community investment to its broader role in the community at the local level and in society at a national, regional or global level. Community reporting includes philanthropic programmes, employee volunteering and industry engagement and demonstrates how it meets identified social needs while contributing to business objectives. This category also includes specific engagement in disaster relief or emergency assistance where required.

ASRA judges will focus on strategic alignment of community investment, clear description of activities and investment in cash/kind, measured reach and outcomes of community investment, and business benefits of community investment.

This award recognises reports which clearly demonstrate how a company’s sustainability strategy supports one or more of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The winning report goes beyond describing a high level of alignment with the SDGs overall. The winning report will report in depth on selected SDGs, providing a detailed review of which SDGs goals – and targets – are advanced through the company’s business and how the company intends to amplify its impacts.

ASRA judges will focus on strategic alignment with selected SDGs, description of SDG targets supported, plans to amplify impacts supporting SDGs and easy navigation.

This award will honour the most creative and attractive design for a sustainability report that inspires people to take an interest in the report. Anything but boring, this report will show how the company has invested in ensuring the design brings the content to life in a way that reflects the company culture and amplifies the sustainability message. Some of the elements that make the report attractive include a considered design theme throughout the report, creative use of colour, tasteful typography, appropriate original photographs, effective use of illustrations, infographics and icons, clear and readable data charts and graphs and use of navigation links to help readers find their way around the report with ease.

ASRA judges will focus on strong design theme, original design elements, effective visuals and easy navigation.

This award will honour the most creative and attractive design for an integrated report that inspires people to take an interest in the report. Anything but boring, this report will show how the company has invested in ensuring the design brings the content to life in a way that reflects the company culture and amplifies the sustainability message. Some of the elements that make the report attractive include a considered design theme throughout the report, creative use of colour, tasteful typography, appropriate original photographs, effective use of illustrations, infographics and icons, clear and readable data charts and graphs and use of navigation links to help readers find their way around the report with ease.

ASRA judges will focus on strong design theme, original design elements, effective visuals and easy navigation.