Our Approach to ESG Reporting

Millicom’s environmental, social, governance (ESG) and fiscal reporting practices are vital in creating long-term business value. We strive to communicate effectively about our business performance and the sustainable value we create for our key stakeholders: investors, customers, employees and communities. 

We ground our approach in the most widely accepted principles and practices while allowing flexibility to respond to emerging issues and risks, and the social and environmental challenges we face in our markets. This allows us to achieve year-to-year consistency, and to adapt our approach as our strategy, capabilities and operating context evolve. 

Our “Shape and Lead” approach, allow us to: 

• More fully align Millicom’s ESG reporting to the company’s strategic priorities 
• More effectively use various reporting standards, frameworks and guidelines 
• Identify improvements that may take longer than one reporting cycle to introduce 

Our Annual Report is mapped against Global Reporting Index (GRI) and Sustainable Accounting Standards Board (SASB) standards. Furthermore, we annually publish a comprehensive overview of our approach to Climate-related Governance, Strategy, Risk Management and Metrics & Targets, as per the TCFD recommendations in our CDP Report.      

How we identify material issues

Our stakeholders help us identify our most material environmental and social impacts. We use their feedback to inform our CR Framework, strategy and our annual report content. In addition to our ongoing stakeholder engagement, in 2020, we conducted a materiality assessment focused on COVID-19 and the impact the pandemic has had on our identified CR issues and overall approach. 

For more details on our latest Materiality Assessment, please click here. 

Stakeholder Engagement

We strive to operate a business that creates shared value for the four key groups that are critical to our business success: investors, customers. employees, and communities. We communicate regularly with these and other stakeholders, at both the global and country levels, through multiple channels such as in-person meetings, surveys, phone calls and other electronic communication. We also analyze yearly questionnaires and assessments from ESG rating agencies and share the results among our business units. This helps us monitor our performance and address gaps in our reporting. 

Below are some specific examples of our key stakeholder interactions: 

• Investors: Our CEO and other executives participate in regular “road shows” to meet with investors on topics such as Millicom’s risk management framework and the company’s financial and non-financial performance. This year, we noted an increase in ESG inquiries, focused on the operationalization of our business purpose, COVID-19 crisis management, employee and contractor health and safety, climate change, life-line services, virtual education, the digital gap and our ESG-Linked financing.    
• Customers: We conduct global and country-level surveys of Millicom customers to help enhance our customer service platform.  
• Employees: We engage employees through surveys, town hall meetings and our Sangre Tigo workshops. These interactions provide insights on topics such as organizational culture, values, and diversity and inclusion.  
• Communities: Through our participation in the Global Network Initiative and significant ESG events and work with our local communities, we actively engage with NGOs, think tanks, academia and other experts. We also gather input from community partners who work with us in our Responsible Leadership in Action programs to   advance our work on child online protection and education, women’s empowerment, digital and financial inclusion and other issues. Our ESG team is in continuous contact with different stakeholders at each country where we operate to solicit feedback on our programs from partners, government entities, and beneficiaries. 

Our ESG reporting is continuously evolving to incorporate stakeholder feedback and address emerging standards, frameworks and regulations in future reports, reflecting and informing our ESG efforts, public commitments and performance.  

For more details visit our Reporting Center and Annual Report.