Monday, 17 August 2015

Unethical companies

The Norges Bank has a list with exclusions in which the Norwegian state fund is not allowed to invest in, based on ethical considerations.

The Guidelines for observation and exclusion from the Government Pension Fund Global can be found here.

More fund managers are looking these days at CSR (Corporate social responsibility) issues and the Norwegian fund is a very large fund, so this list will most likely become more important over time.

On the list of about 65 companies there are several Malaysian companies, the latest additions being Genting and IJM, both because of their plantations. The Malaysian companies:

  • British American Tobacco Bhd (Production of tobacco)
  • IJM Corp Bhd (Severe environmental damages)
  • Genting Bhd (Severe environmental damages)
  • WTK Holdings Bhd (Severe environmental damages)
  • Ta Ann Holdings Bhd (Severe environmental damages)
  • Lingui Development Bhd (Severe environmental damages)

From Singapore:

  • Singapore Technologies Engineering (Anti-personnel land mines)
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3 comments:

  1. Wammo18 August 2015 at 11:38

    Interesting - thanks. Although list seems slightly 'over the place' - some palm oil co's included, others not; various miners etc

    ReplyDelete
  2. M.A. Wind18 August 2015 at 11:39

    Agree, they just look at a few criteria: cigarettes, weapons, acts against nature, etc.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Wammo18 August 2015 at 14:56

    And inconsistently applied - e.g. Rio Tinto - off the list for uranium, but list excludes utilities with nuclear exposure

    ReplyDelete