Anna Jiwon Park has been covering the politics at The Korea Times since the summer of 2024, when she joined the press pool for the Office of the President in Korea. Prior to that, she spent about five years reporting extensively on financial markets, regulatory authorities and the financial industry. She joined The Korea Times in 2019 after spending eight years as a broadcast journalist at Arirang TV, Korea’s leading global broadcaster, covering politics, defense and culture.
Corporations' ESG activities strengthened: report
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By Anna J. Park
By Anna J. Park
Local corporations' efforts to proactively strengthen environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) principles in their management have increased during the past year. According to the latest report by the Korea ESG Research Institute, which analyzed more than 4,700 shareholders' meetings of 707 companies this year, the number of attempts to set up a commission for the goal of sustainable management has increased by 69.5 percent year-on-year, while the number of attempts to establish ESG management committees has soared by 88.2 percent from the previous year.
Increasing gender diversity of corporate governance has also been one of the key changes at the shareholders' meetings, as discussions regarding the appointment of female executive directors at the 10 largest conglomerates in the country have shown a significant year-on-year increase.
Appointments of female executive directors accounted for 12.3 percent of the entire executive director appointment discussions at the observed shareholders' meetings this year, a major increase, given that only 4.8 percent of all listed local companies' executive directors are female.
“Given that the ratio of women among listed companies' executive directors stood at only 4.8 percent in 2021, companies affiliated with the 10 largest conglomerates have shown their efforts in securing gender diversity this year,” the report stated.
Among the 10 conglomerates, Hyundai Heavy Industries showed the highest appointment rate of female non-executive directors with 26.7 percent, while POSCO Group posted the lowest rate of 4.3 percent ― only one out of its 23 executive directors is female.
Meanwhile, the number of companies that implemented half-year or quarterly dividend payments has tripled to 37 from last year's 13, reflecting corporations' increased awareness and tendency to strengthen shareholder value.