24 www.ppf.co.uk Responsible Investment Report 2019/20 25 Being active owners – continued A p p r o Case study ach Continuous engagement with miners on board diversity Through our external provider, we have been engaging with a multinational mining company on a range of themes, from climate change and natural resource E xe use to executive remuneration and risk c u t management. In 2017, concerns included io direct engagement with the chairman on n board structure changes, which resulted in the appointment of two female directors to the 12-member board. Furthermore, in early 2018, the company appointed a new female non-executive director in a step towards 33 per cent female representation. A minimum target was also recommended for 2020, with continued engagement L o from our external provider on this. o k in g f o r Case study w Human capital and and informally) with employees to include a list of companies required ar Corporate governance engagement in Asia corporate culture further understand results. Whilst to comply with the MSA, regardless d Within our passive equity mandates, culture-related metrics and targets of whether they had submitted a we place a high level of scrutiny on are challenging to determine, we compliant statement or not. They Corporate governance can still South Korea: In 2019 our our external managers’ stewardship are now seeing their inclusion in also supported the 'Find It, Fix It, vary across countries. Asset external provider joined the activities. During 2019, our external standardised frameworks such Prevent It' collaborative initiative to owners and external managers Asian Corporate Governance manager piloted a corporate as the Sustainability Accounting combat modern slavery, which called can play an effective role by Association’s (ACGA) culture and human capital project, Standards Board (SASB) and the on UK-listed companies to increase elevating their expectations coordinated engagement with to increase understanding and Workforce Disclosure Initiative. We their efforts to address this issue and assessment within the largest hope to see the emergence of best to support the provision of remedies on stewardship and ESG regulators, government and US technology companies. The practice over the next few years to victims. engagement in these countries. large companies from South project commenced by engaging as more standardised metrics are Japan: The introduction of the Korea on ways to improve with company executives who agreed, and our external manager In another engagement, as an Stewardship Code (2012) and corporate governance, such as had oversight for internal culture, will continue to engage with advisory committee member the Corporate Governance board role and composition, board oversight, strategy and technology companies on this issue. of the PRI’s cobalt supply chain Code (2015) in Japan has executive remuneration, capital remuneration. collaborative engagement, on our supported our engagement management and shareholder Forced labour and behalf, our external provider was protection. Although the responses from modern slavery the sole investor representative to with companies over the last the companies differed, some attend an Organisation for Economic few years. However, there are Our external provider responded to Co-operation and Development-led still some issues associated with commonalities were identified the UK Home Office's consultation (OECD) event and roundtable in the board composition and diversity, during the process. For example, all on potential revisions to the UK’s Democratic Republic of Congo. The and our external provider’s companies conducted engagement Modern Slavery Act (MSA) in 2019 event allowed them to see first- engagements with Japanese surveys with their staff, and most and argued for a requirement to hand the human rights challenges companies are often centred on passed aggregated engagement report on recommended areas, presented in the mining sector and this issue. results to the board, but very instead of adopting a 'comply or share perspectives with local and few gave examples of tangible explain' approach. They supported international stakeholders. board actions arising from survey the creation of a central registry outcomes. This is inconsistent with to enable stakeholders, including our external manager’s expectation investors, to access companies' for boards to engage (formally modern slavery statements, to