Mumbai: As many as 16 Indian companies, including IT bigwigs Infosys and TCS, have expressed worries about the risks of climate change to their businesses in the next five years, says a report by global forum Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) stated.
"As climate change threats are on the rise, risks to businesses are also correspondingly increasing. A group of world's biggest companies representing nearly 17 trillion US Dollars (USD) in market capitalization have valued the climate risks to their businesses at almost 1 trillion USD - with many likely to hit within the next five years," it said.
The companies are - Infosys Ltd, Tata Consultancy Services(TCS), GAIL, Axis Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank, State Bank of India, Mahindra and Mahindra Financial Services, Hindustan Zinc, Indian Hotels Co. Ltd, Shree Cement, Tata Chemicals, Tata Global Beverages, Tata Motors, Tata Power Co, Wipro and Arvind Ltd, a textile company.
"A significant proportion of our workforce is based out of offices in coastal cities like Mumbai, Chennai and Kolkata which have high exposure to extreme weather events like precipitation, cyclones, rise in sea level, etc," the report said quoting TCS.
The report said, banks lend money to a myriad of industries that face direct climate risks such as increased instances of natural disasters, depletion of water resources and impact on human capital. It said that Axis Bank is a lender to the agricultural sector, which has a high risk of crop failures.
