Universal Business School is a first management institute to publish ESG Report
70% of our energy generated from our own solar park and rooftop systems: Universal Business School.
All major corporations are expected to account for their environmental and social footprint. This is carried out through a diverse set of standards, frameworks, and metrics related to what is referred to as an ESG (environment, social, governance) report. Such reporting enables the corporations to better manage their contributions to the attainment of the United Nations SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals). Tarun Anand, Chairman Universal Business School- India's first Green Business School, believes that this orientation towards sustainability has to begin at the management education stage. He backs it up by being the first B School in India to put out an ESG report of its own.
Regulators and shareholders are urging Indian companies to adopt ESG norms. India ranks 120th on sustainability among 193 nations and this can change only with positive action. In June 2021, CRISIL Ltd- India's premier credit rating agency , launched its ESG scores for 225 companies, across 18 sectors in India. Unsurprisingly, the analysis showed that companies with the highest ESG score within a sector, outperform the sector average by nearly 9 points!
India's business schools need to take note and prepare their cohort for ESG adaptability. The Universal Business School in Mumbai, India's first Green Business School has emerged as a disruptor by being the first business school in India to launch its own ESG report, disclosing its environmental and social footprint. This is significant, because in the past, business schools have only provided guidance on how these reports are to be written. For eg; Harvard Business School has written a series of working papers on how the ESG reports of corporations need to get better. (https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=60806)
At a time when sustainability has stopped being about words and needs proper backing up with action, the ESG report published by Universal Business School's states as follows-
70 % of the total energy utilised by the campus comes from the solar park and rooftop systems.
The campus is home to 16 acres of green zone habitat spread across the campus is dedicated to various flora and fauna including frog species, snakes, woodpeckers, butterflies and 7500 plant species.
The campus has 3 water harvesting ponds on 2 acres of land and 3 waste management plants .
Speaking about the report, Tarun Anand, Chairman, Universal Business School says, “ Mindset change has to begin at the management education stage. With this ESG report we wish to embrace the concept of sustainability in totality. If businesses are to transform themselves and become ecologically sustainable (as well as inclusive), it is the management students of today, who can achieve it. Ecological responsibility has to be integrated into every business school's curriculum and the faculty itself has to be immersed in sustainable thinking- in order to be able to transfer the knowledge."
The ESG report also highlights some of the noteworthy social initiatives taken by the students and faculty towards fostering social wellbeing and inclusion. For example, Universal Business School has partnered with ENACTUS, an international non-profit organisation, to provide eye glasses to more than 500 older adults suffering from blindness. The students of the B-school have also trained more than 500 local tribal children in various health and hygiene activities in collaboration with local NGOs and so on.
The ESG report also covers effective governance. “We have equal representation of female and male faculty members. In our administrative department we have 40 % female staff besides female department heads and directors, ” shares Dr Asha Bhatia, Director- Research and Faculty In charge of ENACTUS at UBS.
Disclaimer: This is a company press release. No HT journalist is involved in creation of this content.