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How Fortune Global 500 companies fall short on ESG
The Fortune Global 500 is out, and for those interested in gender parity or the green transition, it doesn’t carry a lot of good news. Here are the two most striking impact-related trends I spotted.
Relatively few female CEOs
The Fortune Global 500 doesn’t feature many women at the helm—in fact, the opposite is true. Only 29 out of 500 of the world’s largest companies by revenue, or less than 6%, are led by women. It is a lower percentage than in the Fortune 500, which boasts an equally unimpressive 10% of women at the helm of the biggest U.S. companies by revenue.
The countries without women-led companies on the Global 500 may surprise you. Of the 41 Japanese companies, not a single one of those is led by a woman. The same is true for the five Scandinavian companies that made the list.
In Germany, zero out of its 30 companies on the list is led by a woman. This puts the country at odds with its reputation abroad, with Angela Merkel as its former longtime leader, and its ranking 6 in gender parity worldwide, according to the World Economic Forum.
Yet it won’t come as a surprise to those who know the German labor market well. “The system in Germany—like in its German-speaking neighbours Austria and Switzerland—is stacked against women, especially those with children,” a 2021 Bloomberg article noted. “It includes a tax regime that critics say discourages two-career families, a lack of affordable daycare, and a tradition that frowns upon the practice of sending children to full-day kindergarten.”
According to the Swedish-German nonprofit AllBright, the lack of women in business leadership positions will come to haunt Germany. Its “male-dominated corporate culture” is missing the “sign of the times,” it wrote in a report last year. “It’s essential, more than ever, to win over the best brains—including first and foremost those of women,” the report authors wrote. But as the data show, their memo didn’t reach German board rooms yet.
Elsewhere, there are some positive signs for women leaders: Indonesia (1 out of 1 on the list), Ireland (1 of 3), and Brazil (2 of 10). Among the world’s largest economies, the U.S. has 15 out of its 36 Global 500 companies led by women (11%), France and Britain each have 13% (3 out of 24 and 2 out of 15, respectively), and China lags far behind at 3 out of 142, or 2%.
Oil is the new oil
When studying the 2023 Global 500, you might think you’re looking at the list from a decade ago, considering the high ranking and prevalence of oil and gas companies. Saudi Aramco (#2), China National Petroleum (#5), Sinopec (#6), Exxon Mobil (#6), and Shell (#9) all made it to the top 10, with Total, BP, Chevron, and others not far behind. Thank Russia’s war on Ukraine and the post-COVID supply crunch for that, as the ranking takes into account 2022 revenues.
E.ON (#73) is the only energy company in the top 100 that derives more than 50% of its energy from renewable sources. A major reason, no doubt, is the spinoff of its legacy oil and gas business into a standalone organisation called Uniper (#19) a few years back. Other energy companies that derive less than 50% of their energy from oil and gas include Electricité de France (#55) and Enel (#59), but in their case, nuclear fills the gap between renewables and fossil fuels.
Of course, many existing oil majors are investing in clean energy. Companies on the list in other industries that are known for their clean energy innovations include General Electric, Iberdrola, Siemens, Alstom, and Tesla. But it’s striking that, when a large part of societal and political discourse is centred on climate change and the energy transition, that transition seems to be everywhere but on the Fortune Global 500 list.
Peter Vanham Executive Editor, Fortune [email protected]