Singapore-based environmental, social, and governance (ESG) data and technology solutions company STACS, has launched upgrades to its ESGpedia platform, offering digital tools to help businesses and financial institutions comply with the increasing ESG regulatory requirements across Europe and Asia.

With that, ESGpedia also unveiled several key use cases with banks and corporates across the ASEAN region, STACS said in a statement on Thursday.

It is noted that starting from 2024, more than 50,000 European Union (EU) companies and 10,000 non-EU companies will be directly in scope under the European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS), and this coverage includes their value chains, of which 90 percent is represented by small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) largely in Asia.

Various Asia markets have also implemented mandatory regulatory reporting to enhance the adoption of global sustainability and ESG standards such as the International Financial Reporting Standards’ (IFRS) inaugural ISSB standard, with many disclosure requirements extending to large non-listed companies and SMEs.

While financial institutions and large corporates need access to ESG data of SMEs in their supply chains, STACS noted that they face a lack of data, especially in the Asia Pacific region.

To help to plug the ESG data gaps in Asia Pacific and provide a complete ESG database, it said ESGpedia has enhanced its artificial intelligence (AI)-powered engine to provide a dual approach – Nexus and Intelligence.

According to the statement, ESGpedia Nexus enables companies of various ESG maturities to achieve their end-to-end business needs and full readiness through active engagement and its marketplace of sustainability solutions.

To lower barriers to sustainability, it said companies can create their free ESG profile with simplified ESG metrics scalable to support international assessments and standards reporting.

The platform offers digital tools that automatically convert operational data like fuel, refrigerant, and electricity consumption to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions under the standard GHG Protocol, localised to all Asia Pacific countries.

To help companies take positive actions towards ESG excellence, ESGpedia Nexus provides a marketplace where companies can amplify their ESG profile, and sell or procure ESG services.

ESGpedia Intelligence empowers banks, investors, insurers, and corporates to overcome data fragmentation and provide a complete picture with aggregated ESG data across countries and sectors via AI-powered harmonisation of unstructured ESG data.

Since the launch of ESGpedia version 2.0 in May earlier this year with 5 million sustainability data points, the platform has since strengthened its AI-capabilities in aggregating, harmonising, and standardising ESG data (to even smart extraction of ESG metrices from documents) and enhanced its data coverage – it now includes 300,000+ companies’ sustainability data, of which 115,000+ company profiles have full corporate data overlaid and standardized.

As a key development, the platform now offers Taxonomy Regulatory Mapping which provides digital automation to transform portfolio data to regulatory needs like ESRS, Environmental Risk Questionnaire (ERQ) in Singapore, Climate Change and Principle-based Taxonomy (CCPT) Due Diligence in Malaysia, Philippines SEC Sustainability Reporting Form (SuRe), and more.

In May 2023, ESGpedia launched the ESCAP Sustainable Business Network (ESBN) Asia-Pacific Green Deal for Businesses digital program on ESGpedia, in partnership with ESBN.

This provides a digitalized and simplified self-assessment tool meant to lower the barriers to entry for corporates and SMEs, in order to help them kickstart their sustainability journey.

This will help companies report metrics that are aligned with stakeholders’ needs and provide them an automated calculation of their GHG emissions, localised to multiple countries in Asia Pacific.

Companies which pledge their support and complete the digital assessment will be awarded an ESBN Green Deal badge in Gold, Silver, or Green to recognize their commitment to sustainability.

Since then, ESGpedia has supported more than 100 companies across Asia-Pacific to achieve their ESBN Green Deal badge.

The platform has also rapidly expanded across Asia, launching in several ASEAN markets including Vietnam, the Philippines, and most recently, Indonesia, to support countries’ local ecosystems, financial sector, and businesses in their ESG journey.

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