Sustainability

INTRODUCTION

Remgro’s value system incorporates the guidelines for doing business successfully drawn up by its founder, Dr Rupert, nearly 60 years ago. These guidelines include the following:

• Honesty – because it lasts the longest
• Correctness – because it creates trust with friends and opponents
• Courtesy – which means dignity without pride and friendliness without subservience
• Service – in every respect to your client, your fellow man, your country
• Mutual support – so that you push others up the ladder of success while climbing yourself, because if you pull others down, you will also fall
• Trust – the belief that all will work out well if everyone is doing their duty

Remgro believes that these values incorporate the spirit in which it strives to be a good corporate citizen. From the above it is evident that the three pillars of sustainable development, namely economic, social and environmental sustainability practices, have always been part of Remgro’s core values. Remgro intentionally interacts and responds to the opportunities and challenges presented by the dynamic system created by these three pillars and the capitals that Remgro uses, including the financial, manufactured, intellectual, human, social and relationship and natural capitals and, as part of its oversight function, the Remgro Board is alert to the viability of Remgro with regard to its reliance on the aforementioned capitals.

Remgro is fully committed to managing its business in a sustainable way and upholding the highest standards of ethics and corporate governance practices. While corporate governance, risk and opportunities management and technology and information governance are addressed in the Corporate Governance and Risk and Opportunities Management Reports, the Sustainable Development Report provides a better understanding of Remgro’s efforts on the social and environmental front in order to achieve its key objectives of maximising value creation over the short, medium and long term; while doing business ethically. Refer to the table below for Remgro’s external recognition and achievements during the reporting period in this regard.

Sustainability highlights

combined assurance

EXTERNAL ASSURANCE

We acknowledge the increasing requirements from investors and regulatory and other guidelines, such as the King IV Report on Corporate Governance for South Africa (2016) (King IV) and the integrated reporting guidelines, for the external assurance of selected non-financial information. We further acknowledge our accountability to our stakeholders to present information that is relevant, accurate and reliable. In this regard it should be noted that Remgro follows a combined assurance model, incorporating management, internal audit and external assurance (e.g. BBBEE scorecard verification, Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) verification), as illustrated in the table above. We believe that these assurance methods provide the necessary assurance over the quality and reliability of the information presented. The different options and levels of external assurance available are continuously being reassessed to determine the way forward on external assurance.

MANAGEMENT’s APPROACH to sustainability

Remgro’s Board is ultimately accountable for the performance of the Company, appreciating that strategy, risk, performance and sustainability are inseparable. In this regard the Board has delegated the general oversight and reporting of sustainability to the Audit and Risk Committee, assisted by the Social and Ethics Committee. The role and function of these committees are dealt with in more detail in the Corporate Governance Report and the Social and Ethics Committee Report.

ETHICS COMPETITION AND COMPLIANCE

Ethics

The Board believes that ethical behaviour stems from appropriate value systems inherent to the people in the Company’s employ as directed and supported by visual ethical leadership and a value-driven corporate culture. Leadership based on ethical foundations results in a culture of ethical and moral behaviour and compliance with laws, rules, codes and standards. The Board therefore retains the responsibility to establish and maintain a culture of honesty, integrity, competence, transparency, fairness, responsibility and accountability in order to position the Company as an investment partner of choice. This is underscored by ethical leadership as ethics cannot be regulated but stems from personal conviction.

In this regard the Company has adopted a Code of Ethics (the code) that provides a framework of ethical practices and business conduct that are applicable to all directors and employees. The code is available to all employees on Remgro’s in-house intranet and a copy is provided to all new employees. The code as well as a formal Gifts Policy also provide strict policies regarding gifts, invitations or favours received from suppliers or any other parties. The offering of favours to gain unfair commercial advantages is also strictly prohibited.

The Audit and Risk Committee monitors compliance with the code and addresses instances of fraud or irregularities. The Group has an effective fraud prevention and detection process and ensures compliance and risk mitigation. No material investigations were concluded during the reporting period.

The Company has implemented an Ethics hotline to enable any employee or other stakeholder to report knowledge of perceived and alleged irregular or unethical behaviour in a confidential and controlled environment. The Ethics hotline is managed by an independent third party and is available on a 24-hour basis. During the year under review no calls were received through the Ethics hotline which related to alleged governance breaches or ethical anomalies at Remgro. Where calls are received which relate to alleged irregularities at investee companies, such calls are directed to the appropriate governance structures at the respective investee companies via the Remgro representatives serving on the boards of these companies.

Competition

The Group supports and adheres to the relevant competition and anti-trust laws applicable in the various jurisdictions in which the Group operates. During the year under review no enquiries regarding anti-competitive, anti-trust or similar conduct were received which resulted in fines being levied.

Compliance

During the year under review there were no incidents of material non-compliance with any laws, regulations, accepted standards or codes, and no fines were imposed in this regard.