SM to gather private sector in landmark sustainability summit

In the first Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) Sustainability Summit in the Philippines, SM, alongside other large Philippine firms and organizations, will spur discussions on how to promote sustainable development and help bridge the gap in sustainability reporting.

For firms to operate over a long period, they must pay attention to things other than the bottom line.

These include managing the impact on the global or local environment, community, society and economy.

To reflect their economic, environmental, social and governance performance, a sustainability report is issued by corporates and organizations.

The summit’s lead convenor, the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), has partnered with the SM group of companies led by SM Investments Corp., the Australian Embassy in the Philippines, the Philippine Business for Environment and the Makati Business Club in launching this summit in the country.

The sustainability summit will be held on Oct. 8 at the Conrad Manila.

The main speakers are Sunny Verghese, Co-Founder and Group CEO of Olam International Limited and the Chairman of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development; and Tim Mohin, Chief Executive of GRI.

Heads of leading businesses will also give industry perspectives on how Philippine businesses could pave the way to a Sustainable Philippines.

They are Teresita Sy-Coson, SM Investments Corp. vice chair and concurrently chairperson of BDO Unibank; Hans T. Sy, chair of the Executive Committee of SM Prime Holdings; Jaime Augusto Zobel de Ayala, president and CEO of Ayala Corp.; Justo Ortiz, chair of the Board of Directors of Union Bank of the Philippines; Irwin Lee, president and CEO of Universal Robina Corp. and Vincent S. Perez, Jr., co-founder and chair of Alternergy.