HNB, DIMO and HNB Assurance win ACCA Awards

Sri Lanka's most transparent and accountable business entities were felicitated at the annual ACCA Sustainability Reporting Awards held for the fifth consecutive year.

The Award winners

This year, companies under the categories of small, medium and large were rewarded for their reporting tenets benchmarked against GRI guidelines.

Hatton National Bank, DIMO and HNB Assurance emerged winners in the large, medium and small categories with Chemanex and Union Assurance coming in as runners up in the small and medium categories respectively.

The large category saw Ceylon Tobacco Company and John Keells Holdings adjudged as joint runners up.

Chief Guest, Director of GRI Focal Point India Dr. Aditi Haldar said, 'accounting for sustainability and preparation of reports present key environmental, social and economic information alongside more conventional financial information to give a more rounded and balanced picture of the organisation's overall performance, enable environmental and social performance to be better connected with strategy and financial performance, and thereby embed into day-to-day operations and decision making. But the challenge is to ensure that sustainability information is included in mainstream reporting, is strategically important and forms part of the decision making process of the business, reflecting the organisation's strategy and the way it is managed. According to the Judges' Report, HNB had a detailed coverage of its impacts and the commitment of top management to deal with such impacts. The sustainability reporting approach clearly indicates strategy and implementation through a credible process.

There was clarity to the objectives and a commitment to transparency for stakeholders to have their concerns addressed in this report.

It says the DIMO report is excellently presented, covering the peculiar impacts on the environment, a quantitative assessment of these impacts and the progress made to curb and mitigate these with an assurance given scoring on credibility. Future focus is also well articulated as was in the HNB Report with detailed processes implemented to meet future goals.

HNB Assurance scored very high in completeness and communication with a clear adherence to the requirements of sustainability reporting.