Bringing out regular sustainability reports by real estate players in India may become a norm in the future. A few developers in the real estate segment are doing it now and in the near future coming out with ESG report may become a norm especially among the listed players in the segment. It is just not profit and loss any more for real estate players but one has to show responsibility towards their environment. These observations were made by Mallanna Sasalu, Chief Operating Officer of Provident Housing Limited (PHL) during a press briefing. Sasalu released the second sustainability report of PHL that covers a period of two years from April 1 2021 to March 31, 2023.
“It is just not the air or the water but it is how we treat the earth and how we treat our employees etc. I believe it will become a norm and it should become a norm to bring out regular sustainability reports. We do not have any regulatory requirement to file a sustainability report every year but we are doing it on a voluntary basis. We understand that regulations will become very much stringent in the years to come and if one starts then it would be very difficult to bring out reports and adhere to norms all of a sudden. We have been doing this for the second time in a row and every year it will come out. We will be better placed because we have already taken action towards being sustainable,” said Sasalu.
He said when real estate players will see their competitors doing it, then they will also come forward to bring out their sustainability reports regularly. “In the future I foresee that real estate players in India will also be regulated by the government to come out with regular ESG reports. It is just not the air or the water but it is how we treat the earth and how we treat our employees etc. I believe it will become a norm and it should become a norm to bring out regular sustainability reports,” remarked Sasalu.
PHL, a real estate major headquartered in Bangalore, has prepared its sustainability report in accordance with the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) Standards. In line with GRI requirements, the report presents economic, social, environmental and governance impacts and contributions of their company. “In this report, we have disclosed our performance against the most important material aspects for our stakeholders. We identified these material matters during previous years’ stakeholder engagement and validated during the writing of this report based on the changes in the new disclosure standard. The reporting concepts of stakeholder inclusivity, sustainable context, materiality, and completeness inspired the content of this report. At the same time, the criteria of accuracy, balance, clarity, comparability, reliability, and timeliness define the report quality. The reporting principles guided the materiality approach and the preparation of this report,” said Sasalu.
As per the International Energy Agency (IEA, 2022), buildings and other construction industry accounts for nearly 40 per cent of all global emissions. “The structures we create today will generate emissions throughout their life cycle. If we build using sustainable practices following building codes for energy optimization and design in a way that energy consumption for each household goes down, water management is optimized for urban living, and waste can be managed etc., these buildings will work towards decarbonizing the planet. We recognize that we have a massive role in contributing towards organizations’ and country’s decarbonization goals,” pointed out Sasalu.