Science has proven that the impact of climate change is already quite urgent. The climate issue has attracted great international attention. Countries have successively put forward declarations and actions for "net zero emissions by 2050". In response to the global net zero trend, Taiwan officially released the "Taiwan’s Pathway to Net-Zero Emissions in 2050" in March 2022. It will use the four major transformation strategies of "energy", "industry", "life" and "society", and the two major governance foundations of "scientific and technological R&D" and "climate legislation", supplemented by "12 key strategies", to formulate an action plan to implement the goal of net zero transformation.
In addition, the government announced the "2050 Net Zero Transformation Phase Goals and Actions" and announced at the end of the year that the country's net GHG emissions in 2030 should be reduced to "28±2% of the 2005 base year emissions", an increase of 5 percentage points compared to the national self-determined contribution target of "24%±1%" announced in 2022.
As a state-owned enterprise, and with the goal of " Becoming a benchmark enterprise in health and green industries in Asia-Pacific Region", TSC cannot be absent from our country's net zero action. In addition to making climate-related financial disclosures, after the government announced the "Taiwan’s Pathway to Net-Zero Emissions in 2050", TSC first merged the original Energy Sustainability Team and the Environmental Sustainability Team into the Environmental Sustainability and Net Zero Team, and established a cross-departmental task force “Net Zero Working Group” to formulate Taiwan Sugar's 2050 net zero emission path and goals.
In the core business of TSC, agriculture and livestock business both belong to biological industries. The company’s main niche, “land,” belongs to an immovable resource. High temperatures, droughts, and floods caused by climate change will directly impact TSC’s biological and land assets. Meanwhile, the threat of extreme weather also facilitated the consensus between the public and the governments. In order to alleviate global warming, relevant laws and regulations have been established, and this change also directly brings risks or opportunities to enterprises.
To work in line with the government’s energy transformation policy of Net Zero by 2050, TSC initiated a research project entitled Strategic Evaluation and Suggestions on the Net-Zero Transformation of Taiwan Sugar Corporation. TSC has taken the inventories of its resources of net-zero emission pathway from the perspectives of policies, regulations, and technological feasibility. In addition, we also referred to the Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) announced by Financial Stability Board (FSB) and the four core elements of information disclosure, namely Governance, Strategy, Risk Management, and Metrics and Targets, for the establishment of the climate change governance framework, identification of material risks and opportunities that may be caused to operations, proposals for relevant corresponding strategies, and establishment of climate-related metrics and targets that can be continuously managed.
In August 2023, TSC responded to the TCFD initiative by signing up as TCFD Supporters. At same year, we completed our first "TSC Climate-Related Financial Disclosure Report" for internal reference. To continuously enhance corporate resilience in response to climate change, TSC plans to complete its second TCFD report in 2025, as part of our commitment to taking action to mitigate global warming.
In response to the international trend of financialization of sustainable information, the Financial Supervisory Commission has formulated a phased plan for the introduction of the international sustainability disclosure standards IFRS S1/S2 for domestic enterprises. The current regulations apply to TWSE/TPEx listed companies and will be implemented between 2026 and 2028 based on the size of capital. There are no specific requirements for public companies. As a state-owned and public company, Taiwan Sugar Corporation has added its budget to the sustainability disclosure items in accordance with regulations and disclosed climate-related information in its annual report to shareholders. The introduction of international sustainable disclosure standards will also be handled in accordance with the planning schedules of relevant competent authorities and in accordance with legal requirements.
