December 22, 2020
PAO Severstal, one of the world’s leading vertically integrated steel and
mining companies, announces that MSCI has revised its ESG rating upwards from
‘CCC’ to ‘B’ in its latest assessment.
The upgrade comes as a result of marked improvements in the ‘Ecology’
section of MSCI’s assessment, and the Company’s progress was also noted in the
areas of ‘Climate Change’, ‘Water Resources Management’, ‘Biodiversity’ and
‘Emissions and Waste’.
MSCI’s ESG (environmental, social and governance) rating includes over 8,500
companies globally and is designed to assess the long-term resilience of a
company to ESG risks. Detailed information on the MSCI ESG rating is available
here.
The ratings upgrade is further indication of the significant sustainability
progress made by the Company in 2020, having launched its enhanced greenhouse
gas emissions reduction strategy and invested 1.34 billion rubles in
environmental activities in the first half of 2020. This has resulted in
improvements in other ESG ratings assessments, with the Company receiving
improved scores from Sustainalytics and SAM S&P, as well as being included
in the FTSE4Good index as a result of enhanced sustainability performance.
Alexander Shevelev, CEO of Severstal, commented:
“The improvement to our MSCI ESG rating is a testament to the significant
work done by Severstal to further enhance its performance against different ESG
metrics, and demonstrates the Company’s desire to be as open and transparent as
possible in its ESG disclosure. This has also been reflected in the positive
response we have received from the investment community this year. We hope that
our efforts will continue to be reflected through improved sustainability
ratings in the future and to become an industry leader in these assessments.
For us, as a socially responsible company, making a positive contribution to
the lives of future generations is of utmost importance.”
A year of environmental progress
In July 2020, the Board of Directors of Severstal approved a public goal of
reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 3% by 2023 compared with 2020 levels, and
the Company is also working on a long-term climate strategy. In addition,
Severstal is implementing a broad programme to reduce its environmental impact
through a large-scale environmentally-oriented refurbishment of its main
assets. In December, the Company launched the first block of coking coal
battery No. 11 designed using the latest technological developments in the
field of environmental protection, and in the near future the Company plans to
commission blast furnace No. 3 guided by a unique approach which will help to
mitigate its negative effects on the environment. Severstal also has a new
overarching goal of reducing atmospheric emissions at its operations by 13% by
2025. In 2019, the Company’s investments in environmental projects amounted to
about 750 million rubles, and by the end of the first half of 2020, the Company
had already invested 1.34 billion rubles in environmental activities.
Continued ESG ratings improvements
Previously in 2020, the Company has also reported an improvement in its
performance in other ESG ratings assessments. Sustainalytics reduced the risk
level assigned to the Company from 39.1 points in 2019 to 34.7 (a lower number
equates a lower risk level). With this reduction in risk level, Severstal
entered the top 10% of steel companies globally for minimizing ESG risks,
ranking 14th out of 140. In SAM S&P’s (formerly RobecoSAM) corporate
sustainability rating, Severstal’s score increased by 7 points, from 41 to 48
points (out of 100 possible), meaning the Company is ranked 15th for its ESG
rating among global metallurgical companies. The FTSE Russell ratings agency
also confirmed the Company’s position in the FTSE4Good index as a result of the
latest ratings revision for the Company, which was raised to 3.5 from 3.0 in
2019, out of a maximum possible score of 5.
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