Message from Chairman of the Panel of Judges
As the Chairman of the panel of judges of the CMA Excellence in Integrated Reporting Awards 2022, it is my great honour and privilege to deliver the welcome address on behalf of the judging panel.
The purpose of Integrated Reporting is to promote “a more cohesive and efficient approach to corporate reporting and aims to improve the quality of information available to providers of financial capital to enable a more efficient and productive allocation of capital”. There are four critical aspects to the purpose of IR. First, it is a “cohesive and efficient approach to corporate reporting” as it provides a reasoned and structurally sound framework that allows a company to report its stewardship of the capitals. Secondly, IR improves the “quality of information” as it provides a systematic and careful approach on how information is to be evaluated for materiality and to be reported in a concise, consistent and effective manner. Third, IR is specifically targeted at “providers of financial capital”. In today’s world, companies have multiple stakeholders with multiple reporting regimes and obligations. Nonetheless, IR identifies that its report is produced primarily for “providers of financial capital” which helps to narrow the focus of responsibility and accountability. Without this narrow focus, corporate reports may suffer from want of reporting to all but no one benefits from it. Finally, IR will promote the “efficient and productive allocation of capital” for the simple reason that sufficient and effective information is provided to the “providers of financial capital” for their decision making. These are the core tenets of IR. For a country like Sri Lanka which has many resources and potentials to be a great economic metropolis, IR will provide the companies in Sri Lanka with a significant tool to tap into global investment capital. This is because companies which use IR for corporate reporting will be providing sufficient and effective information to the providers of financial capital for their investment purposes. This is the need of the hour for Sri Lanka.
I applaud the vision of Professor Watawala and CMA Sri Lanka for inaugurating this Excellence in Integrated Reporting Award in 2015. In these last 8 years, we have seen how the competition has encouraged companies to adopt IR and we have also seen the significant progress in IR amongst companies in Sri Lanka.
I shall labour to remind all of us that the “purpose of the Excellence in
In these 8 years of competition, annually there were between 39 to 50 entries except for the Covid year of 2020. Altogether, the competition has received more than 180 entries and 47 different companies participating. I like to call out 6 companies which had participated in all these 8 years: Diesel & Motor Engineering (DIMO) PLC, Hatton National Bank PLC, HNB Finance PLC, John Keells Holdings PLC, National Development Bank PLC and People’s Leasing & Finance PLC. Their commitment to IR is unwavering and an inspiration to companies in Sri Lanka. I must mention that DIMO PLC has set a blazing trail by being the top company in the excellence in IR in all the 8 years of competition.
2021/22 was a very challenging period for the competition as companies faced the internal social and economic turmoil and the harsh external environment of inflation, supply chain disruptions and increasing interest rates amongst others. To make matter worst, numerous reporting regimes coexist in the corporate reporting landscape. The various reporting regimes require voluminous amount of information to be produced. However, the extent information can contradict the concise characteristics of IR. In addition, the information produced becomes a challenge for readers to digest and comprehend. This will be an on-going challenge. However, IR can be a significant solution as IR is a tested and proven reporting framework that allows the production of decision relevant information for providers of financial capital in a concise, effective and meaningful way. The IR framework will not only result in a concise and meaningful presentation of information, it also promotes integrated thinking in value creation for a company as it ties up all the value enhancing activities of the company in order for IR to be produced. May I take the opportunity to thank Professor Watawala and CMA Sri Lanka for the vision to create this competition to spur the companies in Sri Lanka to a market best practice in corporate reporting. I like to put on record the significant work, time and efforts by the members of three technical evaluation panels chaired by Prof. Roshan Ajward, Mr. Kusal Nissanka and Mr. Deshapriya Senanayake. I have the significant privilege of serving as a judge alongside my eminent colleagues Professor Graham Terry, Professor Samanthi Senaratne and Mr A. N. Raman since the competition was founded in 2015.
May I wish all the winners my heartiest congratulations and may you continue to bring IR to a higher plain and showcase the quality of companies in Sri Lanka.