Video transcript
A sustainability report shows how a company manages its ESG impacts. For SGX-listed issuers, it is a required annual disclosure. The test: a coherent account, or a data dump? Here is what it needs. It is a structured account of ESG impacts across the year. Environmental, social, governance: emissions, safety, board oversight. It carries evidence, not intent: policies, performance, targets. The board signs off on it.
Every company listed on SGX must publish one, under Rule 711A. It ships to shareholders and the Exchange. Large non-listed firms are phasing in by FY2030. Unlisted SMEs are not required yet. Rule 711B sets six primary components. Material factors, climate disclosures, policies, targets, framework, board statement. Practice Note 7.6 sets the expected structure. Most are comply-or-explain; climate is mandatory.
Singapore phases in climate disclosure with the ISSB. From FY2025, listed firms report Scope 1 and 2. STI constituents add Scope 3 from FY2026. Assurance follows from FY2029; confirm dates with ACRA. Climate governance shows how the board oversees climate risk. Where it sits, how it is reported, how it feeds decisions. The board statement carries the weight.
Two frameworks run in parallel here. GRI asks how the company affects the world. IFRS S1 and S2 ask how sustainability affects value. The same data set feeds both. Production runs on a four-to-five month calendar. It works back from the AGM date. Five months applies only with assurance. Data drives the schedule, not design.
Presentation earns or loses the reader. A bare line, 48,200 tCO2e, tells an analyst little. Add the 2022 baseline and prior-year comparative: down 6%. Same number, made readable. Design and copywriting do the heavy lifting. Walk Production writes and designs these reports for listed companies. We shaped data and narrative for an F&B group's report. Your team and advisers own compliance.
One judgment holds it together: lock materiality first. Settle material topics before the design brief. Then it all reads as one account, not a data dump. Plan yours with Walk Production.
By the time most Singapore companies put a sustainability report into production, the question is rarely whether to publish one. For SGX-listed issuers, Rule 711A settled that years ago. What decides the report’s value is whether it reads as a coherent account of the year or a data dump assembled to clear a filing. A sustainability report is the document in which a company describes how it manages its material environmental, social and governance impacts, including climate-related risks. For an SGX-listed company in Singapore it is a required annual disclosure, not a marketing brochure, and it sits alongside the annual report as part of a regulated reporting cycle.
This guide explains what a sustainability report is, who must publish one, what it has to contain under Singapore rules, how the ISSB climate timeline applies, and what separates a clear report from one that loses its reader. It is written for investor relations, company secretarial, and communications teams preparing a sustainability report for the first time or looking to improve the quality of the next cycle.
A note on scope. Walk Production is an integrated creative agency that designs and writes sustainability, annual, and integrated reports for listed companies and organizations across Malaysia and Singapore. We are not an audit, assurance, ESG advisory, or legal firm. This guide is about how to present sustainability information clearly. Confirm your reporting obligations against the current official sources cited below.
What is a sustainability report?
A sustainability report is a structured account of how a company identifies and manages its material environmental, social and governance (ESG) impacts, sets targets, and governs that process across a financial year. For an SGX-listed issuer in Singapore, it is a regulated annual disclosure that the board has to stand behind.
The three ESG pillars each carry concrete material topics for Singapore companies. On the environmental side, a manufacturer’s greenhouse gas emissions across Scope 1 and Scope 2 would typically be a material topic. On the social side, workforce safety rates for a construction or industrial group. On the governance side, how the board oversees ESG strategy and climate risk. A sustainability report sets out the evidence: the policies in place, the performance over the year, and the targets the company has committed to.
What separates a sustainability report from a CSR brochure is that it carries evidence rather than intent, and for listed issuers it is regulated. Where a brochure can describe ambition, the report has to disclose data, methodology, and outcomes against a recognized framework, with the board signing off on what it says.
Who has to publish a sustainability report in Singapore?
Every company listed on SGX must publish an annual sustainability report. Singapore is also phasing in mandatory climate reporting for large non-listed companies. Private companies with no listing are not yet required to publish one, though investors and lenders increasingly expect it.
Under Listing Rule 711A, every SGX-listed issuer must prepare an annual sustainability report and issue it to shareholders and the Exchange alongside the annual report, or within five months of the financial year-end where the report has been externally assured.
Singapore is also phasing in mandatory ISSB-based reporting for large non-listed companies (Large NLCos), though in an August 2025 update ACRA and SGX RegCo extended the climate reporting timelines, with Large NLCo ISSB-based reporting now deferred to FY2030. Unlisted SMEs are not mandated today, but supply-chain, bank, and investor pressure is rising across the region, and many are beginning to report voluntarily.
Confirm the current scope of obligations on the SGX Rulebook and the ACRA website, as the regime is actively evolving.
What must a Singapore sustainability report contain?
Under Rule 711B, a sustainability report must address six primary components: material ESG factors, climate-related disclosures, the company’s policies, practices and performance, targets, the reporting framework used, and a board statement with the governance structure. Practice Note 7.6, the SGX Sustainability Reporting Guide, sets out the expected structure and content for how these components are presented.
The table below maps each component to what a reader is looking for on the page. Confirm the current text of Rule 711B on the SGX Rulebook before finalizing content, as the requirements in this area are still being updated.
| Rule 711B component | What a reader looks for |
|---|---|
| Material ESG factors | The topics that matter most to the business and its stakeholders, supported by a materiality process |
| Climate-related disclosures | Governance, strategy, risk management, and metrics aligned to the ISSB climate requirements |
| Policies, practices and performance | Evidence of how the company acts on each material topic, with data |
| Targets | Specific, time-bound commitments with a baseline year |
| Reporting framework | The standard used (GRI, ISSB-aligned), named and described |
| Board statement and governance structure | How the board oversees ESG, and who holds accountability at management level |
Most components operate on a “comply or explain” basis. Climate-related disclosures are now mandatory and cannot be omitted.
Frameworks set what to disclose. This guide is about communicating it clearly.
SGX Listing Rules 711A and 711B, Practice Note 7.6, and the ACRA climate requirements are referenced here as context for what to present clearly, not as compliance advice. Verify all obligations with your advisers and the current official sources before sign-off.
When is a sustainability report due, and how does it sit with the annual report?
A sustainability report must be issued to shareholders and the Exchange at the same time as the annual report, or within five months of the financial year-end where the report has been externally assured. That timing rule sits in Listing Rule 711A, and it means the sustainability report is not an afterthought filed months after the financial statements.
Singapore issuers can choose to integrate sustainability content into the annual report or publish a standalone sustainability report alongside it. Both formats are accepted. The integrated route gives the reader one document but requires the editorial and data teams to keep the financial and sustainability narratives in sync throughout production. A standalone report gives ESG specialists a fuller dedicated publication, at the cost of a second sign-off cycle and a second production run.
Whichever format is chosen, materiality should map to the principal risks discussed in the financial review. A sustainability report that identifies climate risk as a material topic should connect to how the financial statements and the strategy narrative treat that same risk. That alignment is what makes the two halves of a reporting cycle read as one document rather than two.
For a fuller comparison of how the annual and sustainability reports relate to each other, see our guide to annual reports and sustainability reports for Singapore companies.
How long does a sustainability report take to produce?
A listed sustainability report typically runs on a four-to-five month production calendar, set by working backward from the AGM date. The outer edge is fixed by Listing Rule 711A: the report is issued with the annual report, normally within about four months of the financial year-end, or up to five months where it has been externally assured.
That five-month window is not a general extension. It is a deliberate concession to the assurance workstream, so it applies only when assurance is in scope. Confirm the date that actually applies to your issuer on the SGX Rulebook before you set the schedule, because the timing rule depends on whether the report is assured.
| Stage | What happens |
|---|---|
| Concept and data foundation | Materiality refresh, emissions data collection, basis of preparation drafted, integrated-or-standalone decision |
| Drafting and design | Narrative and board statement written, data drops into layout, first proof rounds |
| Sign-off and release | Board approval, external assurance where applicable, final proofs, filing with the Exchange |
The constraint that drives the calendar is data, not design. Climate and ESG figures have to be gathered through the year and compiled alongside the financial close, because the same emissions numbers may later be assured. A report whose data lands late is a report whose proofs slip, so the schedule is built around when the numbers are ready, not when the layout is.
What is climate reporting and the ISSB-aligned timeline?
Singapore is phasing in mandatory, climate-first disclosure aligned with the International Sustainability Standards Board (ISSB). From FY2025 all listed companies report Scope 1 and Scope 2 GHG emissions. Straits Times Index (STI) constituents lead on broader ISSB-based disclosures and Scope 3, with other issuers and external assurance phased in over later years.
One point of confusion is worth clearing up early. IFRS S1, the ISSB’s general requirements standard, is itself effective for annual reporting periods beginning on or after 1 January 2024, with IFRS S2 applied alongside it. Singapore did not adopt those standards directly into law on that date. Instead SGX and ACRA embed climate disclosure through a phased local roadmap with its own start years, which is why the ISSB’s effective date and Singapore’s reporting dates do not line up. Confirm the live position on the ACRA site, since the local schedule has moved.
Per the ACRA climate reporting requirements and timeline, the phased schedule for listed companies runs broadly as follows. The timeline has been updated more than once, so confirm the live position on the ACRA site before relying on any specific date.
| Financial year (beginning) | Requirements for listed companies |
|---|---|
| FY2025 | All listed companies report Scope 1 and 2 GHG emissions; STI constituents add other ISSB-based climate disclosures |
| FY2026 | STI constituents report Scope 3 emissions |
| FY2028 | Non-STI listed companies above $1 billion market cap add ISSB-based climate disclosures |
| FY2029 | External limited assurance on Scope 1 and 2 emissions phases in for listed companies |
| FY2030 | Remaining listed companies report other ISSB-based climate disclosures; Large NLCo ISSB-based reporting begins |
Two practical points follow for the team drafting the report. The basis of preparation and the phased-adoption stage the issuer is in both need naming, so a reader can see which standard the climate content is built against and where the issuer sits on the roadmap. And the Scope 1 and Scope 2 GHG methodology has to be stated transparently, so an assurance provider or analyst can follow the calculation rather than take a headline figure on trust.
What does climate-governance disclosure require of the board?
Climate-governance disclosure is the report’s account of how the board actually oversees climate-related risk, not a statement that it does. The ISSB-aligned structure asks the issuer to describe where climate sits in the board and committee remit, how management reports it upward, and how it feeds strategy and capital decisions. Practice Note 7.6 sets the expected shape of that disclosure.
This is the part of the report most often filled with prior-year boilerplate, and it is the part where boilerplate is most visible. Because the disclosure describes a real process, that process has to exist before the period it covers. A board that decides during the drafting weeks that climate “sits with the risk committee” leaves a gap the disclosure exposes, because there are no minutes, no reporting cadence, and no decisions to point to.
For the team presenting the section, four questions sit behind a credible governance account. Practice Note 7.6 sets the expected structure; what a reader looks for is the substance behind each line.
| What the disclosure should show | What a reader looks for |
|---|---|
| Where climate sits in the board’s remit | A named board or committee with climate explicitly in its terms of reference, not an implied responsibility |
| How management reports climate upward | A stated reporting cadence and the management roles accountable between board meetings |
| How climate feeds decisions | Evidence that climate considerations reach strategy and capital allocation, not only risk registers |
| The board statement under Rule 711B | The board’s own account of having considered sustainability in strategy, determined material factors, and overseen them |
The board statement is the natural home for much of this, and it carries real weight because it is the board speaking in its own voice. An experienced reader checks it for consistency: a statement that asserts oversight while the governance section shows none of the mechanics reads as a gap rather than a strength. Present the statement and the governance section as one account, so the claim and the evidence sit together.
Most components of the report run on a comply-or-explain basis, where an issuer either addresses the component or explains why it has not. The climate-related disclosures are the exception: they are mandatory, so the governance behind them cannot be explained away. Confirm the current scope of what is mandatory for your issuer on the SGX Rulebook before sign-off, since the phased roadmap keeps moving the line.
What reporting frameworks do Singapore companies use: GRI, ISSB and SGX?
Many Singapore reporters use the GRI Standards for stakeholder-facing impact disclosure and the ISSB’s IFRS S1 and S2 for investor-facing financial-materiality disclosure, inside the structure SGX requires. GRI asks how the company affects the world; ISSB asks how sustainability affects enterprise value. In the reports we work on, issuers often run the two in parallel rather than choosing one.
The GRI Standards work through an impact-materiality lens, in a modular structure: GRI 1 sets the foundation, GRI 2 the general disclosures, GRI 3 the materiality assessment, and then Topic and Sector Standards carry the specific content. IFRS S1 and S2, issued by the ISSB, work through a financial-materiality lens, with S2 covering climate specifically and built on the TCFD architecture of governance, strategy, risk management, and metrics and targets. SGX ties the choice together through Rule 711B, which asks the issuer simply to name the framework it has used.
Where the GRI structure repays a closer look is the Sector Standards. These flag the topics most likely to be material for a given sector before a company has run its own materiality assessment, which makes them a useful starting checklist for a first-time reporter. The released standards are GRI 11 Oil and Gas, GRI 12 Coal, GRI 13 Agriculture, Aquaculture and Fishing, and GRI 14 Mining. A Singapore industrial or commodity issuer in one of these sectors can read the relevant Sector Standard first, treat its listed topics as the likely material set, and then test that set against its own stakeholders rather than starting from a blank page. The sector view does not replace the materiality work; it gives that work a sensible point of departure.
GRI Standards
Impact materiality. Reports how the company affects people, communities, and natural systems. Stakeholder-facing. Widely used for the broader ESG narrative.
IFRS S1 / S2 (ISSB)
Financial materiality. Reports how sustainability risks and opportunities affect enterprise value. Investor-facing. Required inside SGX’s ISSB-aligned climate disclosure roadmap.
A first-time reporting team deciding which framework to anchor on should know that the choice is not exclusive. The same underlying data set feeds both. The difference is which question each disclosure is answering, and for which reader.
How do you present sustainability data clearly?
Presentation is where most reports earn or lose a reader. Lead with the headline before the detail, design the few charts that get read in seconds, hold one visual language across financial and sustainability content, and make every table scannable with units stated once.
Concrete guidance for the production team:
- Open with an ESG performance dashboard. Give the reader the key metrics before the full data tables follow. A single spread with headline emissions, safety rates, and governance indicators removes the need to search.
- Design the charts, do not just generate them. A five-year emissions trend is read in five seconds. How that trend line is drawn, labeled, and scaled determines whether the section gets read or skipped.
- Use one visual system across both halves. Consistent typography, color, and chart styling across the financial review and the sustainability section signal that the document is one report, not two bound together.
- Show three-year comparatives with stated baselines. Single-year figures, or methodology changes mid-cycle that make comparison impossible, undercut the credibility that comparative data is designed to build.
A worked example shows what this looks like in practice. Take a manufacturer’s combined Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions. A bare line reading “GHG emissions: 48,200 tCO2e” tells an analyst almost nothing. The same figure, presented, carries its baseline year, its consolidation boundary, its units, the prior-year comparative, and the direction of travel: “Scope 1 and 2 GHG emissions: 48,200 tCO2e (operational control boundary, against a 2022 baseline; down 6 percent on 51,300 tCO2e in the prior year).” The difference is not more data. It is the same number made readable, because the reader can now see what it covers and where it is going. For a social topic such as a construction or industrial group’s workforce-safety rate, the same discipline applies: state the measure, the scope of operations it covers, and the prior-year figure beside it.
A presented number also has to name its method. Most Singapore reporters build Scope 1 and Scope 2 figures on the GHG Protocol Corporate Standard, which provides the requirements for preparing a corporate-level emissions inventory. Naming the methodology, so a reader or assurance provider can follow the calculation, is a presentation choice, not compliance advice. It is the difference between a figure a reader can interrogate and one they have to take on faith.
This is where report design and copywriting do the heavy lifting: turning ESG data into a document a non-specialist shareholder or an ESG analyst can navigate without a glossary.
The single judgment we hold to on the reports we design is to lock the materiality assessment before anyone writes a design brief. When the material topics are settled first, the structure, the data spreads, and the narrative all line up behind the same priorities, and the report reads as one argument. When materiality is still moving while layout is underway, the cost shows up later: spreads get rebuilt, the running order shifts after first proofs, and the late changes are the ones that introduce errors. Getting the sequence right early is far cheaper than reconciling a report that was designed around topics that then changed.
What are the most common mistakes that weaken a sustainability report?
The recurring failures are a section that reads in a different voice from the annual report, climate risks disclosed without the governance behind them, materiality that places every topic in one quadrant, and marketing claims that outrun the qualified language in the report.
- Different voice and visual system from the annual report. A sustainability report that reads as a separate publication, with its own palette and writing register, signals it was bolted on rather than planned alongside.
- Climate disclosure without governance. Listing climate risks is not enough. The report has to describe how the board oversees those risks and what management is doing about them.
- Flat materiality matrix. A matrix that places every topic in the upper-right quadrant tells the reader nothing. Genuinely material matrices show separation between topics.
- Marketing claims that exceed what the report supports. The greenwashing risk most often surfaces where the corporate website or investor presentation uses stronger language than the qualified disclosures in the sustainability report itself.
- Last-minute data reconciliation. ESG data compiled after the financial close rather than alongside it tends to produce inconsistencies between the two halves of the reporting cycle, which show up in the final proofs.
How Walk Production can help
Walk Production is an integrated creative agency that designs and writes sustainability reports, annual reports, and integrated reports for listed companies and organizations across Malaysia and Singapore. Our in-house team handles structure, report copywriting, data visualization, layout design, and print-ready production under one account team. Your reporting team and advisers own framework compliance, materiality, and assurance.
If your next reporting cycle is open, the earlier you align the sustainability narrative with the principal risks in the financial review, the more the report reads as one planned document rather than two. See our sustainability report design service, look through the annual and sustainability reports we have designed, including our sustainability report for QSR Brands, an F&B group, to see how the data and narrative sit together on the page, or talk to the team about the cycle ahead.
