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Despite a slight improvement in the scorecards, Hong Kong-listed firms should work harder to improve their corporate governance, says The South China Morning Post, quoting Kelvin Wong Tin-yau, the chairman of the Hong Kong Institute of Directors.

The SCMP says that the average corporate governance score rose 1.44% to 71.89 from 70.87 last year, but the highest score fell to 85.21 this time around from 92.14 last year.

"Comparing Hong Kong-listed companies with other Asian companies, there is much room for improvement in corporate social responsibility. In some sections of the study, there is huge variation among Hong Kong-listed firms," Baptist University professor Stephen Cheung Yan-leung told the SCMP.

According to the SCMP, the results correspond with a separate study of corporate governance disclosure of Hong Kong-listed and public-sector firms by the Hong Kong Institute of Certified Public Accountants, which gave only two top awards this year as opposed to four last year.

The HKICPA gave its diamond award only to CLP Holdings - for companies in the Hang Seng Index - and the Airport Authority Hong Kong - for enterprises in the public sector. Last year, four diamond awards were given - one each for the Hang Seng Index, public sector, non-Hang Seng Index and H-share categories.
 

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