POSCO ranked 36th in the ‘Global 100 Most Sustainable Corporations in 2015’, the highest ranking of any Korean corporation. As this was announced at the Davos Forum in Switzerland on January 21st (local time), POSCO’s status as a leading global steel corporation was consolidated.
Since 2005, the Davos Forum has been announcing the ‘Global 100 Most Sustainable Corporations’ (hereinafter referred to as Global 100) through the Canadian media-investment consulting company, Corporate Knights.
Corporate Knights examined companies with significant global market capitalization to select the Global 100. Companies were evaluated on 12 main indices, including energy productivity, innovative capacity, staff turnover, and staff versus CEO compensation. In order to achieve high rankings, companies must score well on social, environmental and financial scores, rather than solely on financial measures.
This year’s Global 100 lists four Korean corporations, including POSCO. After ranking 30th, the best ranking ever for Korean corporations in 2012, but POSCO wasn’t included in the Global 100 for the two years following. However, POSCO re-entered at 36th this year, as the first evaluation conducted since the inauguration of CEO Ohjoon Kwon. On the other hand, Samsung Electronics ranked 45th, LG Electronics ranked 51st, and Shinhan Financial Group ranked 70th.
POSCO’s highest ranking of any Korean corporation on the list shows that it has been recognized for the efforts of its staff and executives to create a good workplace with reduced staff turnover through sustainable management. It also brought positive results in terms of transparency of information release, including the *ESG integrated report by POSCO affiliates implemented since last year. POSCO was highly praised for the way it has carried out added-value improvements, such as making steel by-products resources and reusing, and in enhancing innovative capacity through R&D investment.
Along with the selection in the Global 100, POSCO has been selected as an excellent corporation in the SAM-Dow Jones Sustainability Indexes for 10 years running, which is the first case for any company in the steel industry. In particular, POSCO has been awarded in three sectors; POSCO has won the ‘Industry Leader’ as well as the ‘Industry Mover’ who get the highest rated compared to last year, as well as ‘Gold Class’ for being in the 1% of industry leaders.
Meanwhile, POSCO was selected as the ‘No.1 steel competitiveness of the world’ last year by World Steel Dynamics (WSD), a global steel specialized analysis institute. It was the fifth time running to win the prestigious title. The WSD has conducted its evaluation based on 23 indices, including the size of production and profitability, technology innovation, price determination power, cost reduction, financial soundness and securing raw materials, among 36 steel corporations worldwide.
*ESG
Since corporation results in the area of Environment, Social and Governance do not appear in the financial element, ESG is defined as the core evaluation element when deciding investment under the UN Principles for Responsible Investment.