The 1st Round of the CDP Process in Asia has been officially launched with the publication by ASrIA of the first CDP Report at a well attended event in Hong Kong. The ASrIA launch co-incided with other official launches of CDP4 reports in the US, Europe and Japan.

The launch event was well attended by Hong Kong's finance, corporate and civil society community. Presentations on the report were made by Sophie Le Clue, Associate Director of ASrIA and Melissa Brown, Executive Director of ASrIA.

During the briefing Sophie and Melissa noted that it was Korean companies which were presently leading in the region in terms of their responses and the quality of their emissions data.  They summarized by noting that without government leadership and guidance in the region, traditionally disclosure shy Asian companies might be slow to react, but that investors should watch how companies define their future goals.

Launched in December 2000, the CDP has invited institutional investors over four consecutive years (2003 - 2006) to collectively sign a single global request for disclosure of information regarding greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. In doing so it has created one of the largest ever collaborations of global institutional investment capital - at $31.5 trillion of assets under management for CDP4 in 2006. The information requests have historically been sent to some of the largest global companies by market capitalisation.

This year is the first time the CDP has been extended to include a representative sample of Asian corporates. The CDP Asia ex-Japan report produced by ASrIA specifically focuses on disclosures from these companies.

The aim of the CDP is two-fold. Firstly, to inform investors regarding the significant risks and opportunities presented by climate change and secondly, to inform company management regarding the serious concerns of their shareholders regarding the impact of these issues on company value.

As the debate about strategies for addressing climate change matures, there is an urgent need to bring the role of Asia's fastest growing economies into clearer focus. Unfortunately, data gaps at both the country and corporate level are a critical constraint. In general, Asia's largest listed companies lag their global counterparts in reporting on a broad range of environmental, social, and governance risks. As a result, making progress on corporate disclosure of carbon emissions by Asia's corporate leaders is now a priority for global investors.

ASrIA's CDP work aims to begin the process of filling this information gap by mapping the profile of carbon disclosure in the Asia Pacific Region. This report examines the disclosures from 125 Asian companies covering nine countries: China including Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan and Thailand. As a result, this year marks the first time that Asian investors have a representative sample of responses to evaluate on climate change fundamentals. This makes it possible to begin tracking important global sector comparisons and to assess different Asian country level trends.

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