Despite growing awareness of climate risks, just 8% of companies in Asia Pacific region have committed to net-zero targets

• In 2021, a total of 3,879 companies from 21 markets across the Asia Pacific region disclosed their emissions, targets and climate action through CDP’s TCFD-aligned Climate Change questionnaire, representing 14% of global market capitalization;
• However, just 291 companies (8%) reported having net-zero targets in place;
• Less than one-third of responding companies have committed to science-based targets;
• Only 5% of the electricity consumed by the top 100 energy consumers is sourced from renewables.

Other findings include:

• One third (32%) of companies represented in the report are first-time responders, demonstrating growing uptake of environmental disclosure across the region’s markets;
• Organizations with science-based targets in place were found to be four times more likely to decrease their GHG emissions;
• Four out of 10 companies (40%) reported measuring at least one category of their Scope 3 emissions.

Less than 300 out of nearly 4,000 companies in the Asia Pacific region disclosing through CDP (8%) had net-zero targets in place as of 2021, according to a new report by CDP, the non-profit that runs the world’s environmental disclosure system for companies, cities, states and regions, in partnership with leading global climate solutions provider South Pole.

The report, Rising to the Challenge: How companies in Asia Pacific are preparing for the net-zero economy, finds that while the region’s companies showed increased commitment towards emissions reduction and transparent environmental action in 2021, there remains a significant ambition gap in meeting the Paris Agreement goals.

In 2021, a total of 3,879 companies from 21 markets across Asia Pacific disclosed their emissions, targets and climate action through CDP’s TCFD-aligned Climate Change questionnaire, representing 14% of global market capitalization.

This comes after the IPCC’s 2021 Sixth Assessment Report highlighted with unprecedented clarity the urgent need for rapid, sustained, and large-scale greenhouse gas emission (GHG) reductions across all sectors of the global economy.