Summit will tackle Asian CSR apathy

Widescale apathy towards corporate social responsibility among large Asian companies is to be a major topic on the agenda at the next Asia CSR Summit to be held in Bangkok from 3-4 November. Fifty speakers will lead 24 workshops in in-depth discussions in an effort to promote environmental and social responsibility.

The 250 delegates will be asked to consider why so many Asian conglomerates are resistant to CSR – even though many of them are known to be generous with their philanthropy.

Richard Welford, The CSR Asia chairman, thinks the barrier to CSR is partly attributable to the lack of stakeholder pressure: He said: ‘Outside of Japan and Korea, there are very few corporations with global brands in Asia. While many Asian companies are huge, they are often more regionally based than global and are not subject to the scrutiny from customers and other stakeholders that many western brands get.

‘Add to this the fact that many large Asian companies have dominant shareholders, commonly the founders and their families, but sometimes the government or state, and we can begin to see that there is little pressure from traditional stakeholders to engage with CSR.’

Welford pointed out that many companies have had a degree of monopoly power from their governments. ‘Indeed, the historical roots of many Asia companies were connected to a political environment than great entrepreneurialism. The consequence of the history of many Asian companies is that they ended up having a very narrow shareholder base, where the dominant shareholder still calls the shots and where many cite a history of poor governance and downright abuse of minority shareholders.’

However, many Asian manufacturers are, by contrast, subject to competitive pressures because they supply global brand customers, and consequently they are more inclined to see the benefits of CSR policies.