Toyota shareholders are being urged to use the company’s annual general meeting to demand greater transparency in its lobbying efforts.
Greenpeace Australia Pacific is calling on shareholders to support a resolution, filed by institutional investors at Toyota’s latest shareholder meeting, that would change the company’s articles of incorporation.
Australian superannuation funds and Future Super shareholders will support climate resolutions.
This resolution, if passed, would establish a requirement for Toyota Motor Corporation (TMC) to disclose climate change-related lobbying activities in its articles of incorporation.
The annual general meeting will take place on Wednesday, June 14.
“The Company shall conduct a comprehensive annual review and issue a report (at a reasonable cost, excluding proprietary information) that explains if, and how, the Company’s climate-related lobbying activities (directly and through industry associations), including public statements, serve to mitigate risk for the Company from climate change and how it aligns with the goals of the Paris Agreement and the Company’s goal to be carbon neutral by 2050,” the resolution reads.
“The report should disclose any incidents that did not align with those goals, along with actions planned to address them.”
The proposed resolution was submitted by shareholders Kapitalforeningen MP Invest, Storebrand Asset Management AS, and APG Asset Management NV
The TMC board of directors opposed this proposal.
“The Group regards climate change measures as one of its key management tasks and is fully focused on achieving carbon neutrality by 2050,” the board said in its opinion.
“Since 2021, the Group has implemented the initiative stated in this shareholder proposal, which is to review and report on the impact on TMC caused by climate-related public relations activities and alignment with the goals of the Paris Agreement.
“We are committed to updating such information annually taking into account feedback from our stakeholders.”
It argues it has issued an annual report detailing its climate public relations efforts, which it will improve this financial year by appointing a “credentialed third party for review work”.
It also said it plans to double the number of industry associations it surveys to further increase exposure.
“The role of the TMC Board of Directors to deal with these issues is to make flexible and varied decisions according to the circumstances of the time, make agile changes as needed, and quickly turn decisions into action,” he added, emphasizing why it does not want to change the company’s existing articles of incorporation.
“Therefore, ideal exposure conditions are also subject to sudden changes. Generally, the articles of incorporation are intended to define the basic details of the corporation and its operations, and not to prescribe matters related to the conduct of a particular business as in this shareholder proposal.”
While it continues to support a “multi-path” approach to decarbonisation, including hybrid and hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles, it launched many electric vehicles after a slow and rocky start.
It is introducing 10 new EVs by 2026, including an electric ute and an unspecified sports car and compact car for emerging markets.
By 2026, it wants to sell 1.5 million electric vehicles worldwide and by 2030, it aims to increase this number to 3.5 million.
Lexus will go all-electric by 2030 in Europe, North America and China, and will sell only electric cars worldwide by 2035.