Westpac Investment Management has teamed up with Monash University to pro-duce Australia’s first share index to include only environmentally responsible companies.

Westpac Investment Management has teamed up with Monash University to pro-duce Australia’s first share index to include only environmentally responsible companies.

The Westpac-Monash Eco Index will be constructed by Westpac on the basis of an assessment of the company’s environmental credentials by Monash Univerity. Monash will look at environmental strategy, management and stakeholder relations using information from sources such as the university’s proprietary survey, public environmental records, Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) records and the National Pollutants Inventory (NPI). Only 74 companies of the 160 surveyed by Monash qualify for the index at them moment.

The index follows the success of similar schemes in the US. According to Monash University, screening of companies on the basis of environmental criteria almost doubled between 1997 and 1999.

The announcement of the index follows Westpac’s launch of a wholesale environ-ment-based fund from Westpac earlier this year. The Westpac Australian Eco-Share fund has already attracted two of Australia’s largest industry super funds, HESTA and UniSuper. HESTA seeded the fund with a $20 million investment.

The Westpac-Monash Eco index will begin operating in July.