Work

Engagement with health in the climate reports of top corporations

Year: 2026

Type: article

Abstract: • Health content in climate reports from top 500 companies in Australia was assessed. • 51/500 companies (10.2 %) had climate reports in April 2024. • Climate reports tended to be produced by larger companies. • Almost all climate reports included health content. • Two-thirds of the reports referred to specific actions to tackle health impacts. Climate change threatens health and wellbeing globally, requiring the combined attention of multiple societal actors. To assess corporate participation, this study’s objective was to quantify engagement with health in publicly available corporate climate reports in Australia. Climate reports from Australia’s top 500 corporations as determined in September 2023 were obtained in September 2023-April 2024 from their websites or replies to email requests. Content analysis was used to locate and quantify health and other words within the reports. The characteristics of corporations with climate reports were compared to those without climate reports in terms of market capitalisation, sector, emissions reduction, and country of incorporation. Among the top 500 corporations, 51 (10.2 %) had standalone climate reports available by April 2024. Climate reports were predominately found for larger corporations and those with the highest emissions per million AUD market capitalisation. The sector with the greatest proportion of climate reports was the utilities sector (62.5 %). Companies without and with climate reports had a non-significant difference in median absolute change in tonnes of CO 2 equivalents emissions per million AUD market capitalisation (-0.2 vs -6.9, p = 0.706) from 2017–2018 to 2022–2023. Fifty (96.2 %) climate reports mentioned a climate change-related health word. Two-thirds ( n = 34) of climate reports referred to specific actions to tackle health impacts. While a relatively small percentage of top Australian companies, representing a range of sectors, had standalone climate reports in 2023–2024, health impacts and adaptation to reduce these impacts are acknowledged and discussed in most of these climate reports.

Source: The Journal of Climate Change and Health

DOI: 10.1016/j.joclim.2025.100643

Authors: Barbara P F Davis, Paul J Beggs, Petra L Graham

Institution: Macquarie University

Language: English

Topic: Corporate Social Responsibility Reporting

Subfield: Strategy and Management

Field: Business, Management and Accounting

Domain: Social Sciences

SDGs: Climate action, Good health and well-being

Open Access status: gold

Estimated APC paid: $2,200