CSR PROJECTS · 6 min read
Hemas Publishes a Four-Year CSR Reach Number. It Has Fallen Every Year, and No Report Says Why.
Hemas Holdings PLC’s social initiatives affected over 143,100 people during the year ending 31 March 2026; three years earlier, the same table showed 525,500. The company provides more detail on its community programs than most corporate organizations in Sri Lanka, which is why the unexplained drop and the two different spending figures are so apparent.
By the ESGNexus Editorial Team · September 2026 · Estimated reading time: 6 minutes
KEY TAKEAWAYS
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The social projects carried out by Hemas Holdings PLC reached more than 143,100 people during the financial year ending 31 March 2026; three years earlier, the same Performance Highlights table recorded 525,500. The figure has been declining each year, and in three annual reports there is not a single sentence explaining why.
That in itself does not constitute a criticism; it is a reasonable strategy to reach fewer people more deeply, and that is precisely what a company would be expected to report on if it were shifting from widespread distribution to ongoing, locally focused programs. The problem is that the disclosure provides no information that would allow a reader to determine whether such a change actually took place, whether the definition of a ‘reached person’ was altered, or whether the programs became smaller.
What Hemas Publishes That Most of Its Peers Do Not
The fact that this question can be asked of Hemas at all is because Hemas provides more detailed answers than most other organizations. In its Performance Highlights table, “Lives Impacted through Social Projects” is listed as a named metric, with three comparative years alongside it. In the Group CEO’s review, specific programmes are named, and figures are attached to them: six preschools have been added under Piyawara for a total of 79 facilities; over 30,600 women and girls have been supported by the Fems HER Foundation in relation to menstrual health; nearly 60,000 children and teachers through Atlas Learn and Atlas Sipsavi; over 8,000 parents through Baby Cheramy’s parental clinics. The report also includes its own reporting boundaries, and this is precisely what makes the arithmetic below diagnosable rather than simply puzzling.
In its August 2026 review of about 45 listed and 30 large private companies in Sri Lanka, an ESGNexus analysis discovered that almost all of the CSR reporting in this sector consists of output reporting—that is, information on money committed and activities carried out, rather than on measurable outcomes—and noted that there was just one published outcome indicator covering the whole sample. Under those circumstances, a reach figure included in the highlights table with comparisons is not typical. Hemas is examined here because it provided the reader with sufficient information to read.
The Number That Has Fallen for Three Straight Years
| Financial year | Lives impacted through social projects | Community investments (Rs Mn) |
| FY2022/23 | 525,500+ | Not disclosed in the two statements read |
| FY2023/24 | 399,695+ | 32 |
| FY2024/25 | 255,800+ | 35 |
| FY2025/26 | 143,100+ | 67 |
Source: Hemas Holdings PLC, Integrated Annual Report 2025/26, Performance Highlights p.6 and Economic Value-Added Statement p.20; Annual Report 2024/25, Performance Highlights p.9 — hemas.com. Reach figures are the company’s own and are stated as minima. The FY2022/23 community investment figure falls outside the three-year window of the value-added statement as published in the FY2025/26 report.
Across these figures, reported reach fell by roughly 73% between FY2022/23 and FY2025/26, and by roughly 44% in the most recent year alone. Both are ESGNexus calculations based on the company’s disclosures, and both are approximations. Every figure in the series is published as a floor, with a plus sign after it so that the true year-on-year movement could be somewhat smaller. What is not an approximation is the direction. It has been the same for three years running.
Why the Fall Cannot Be Priced
The next question is whether the money obtained—whether spending more on fewer people—achieved something more substantial. This question cannot be answered because of two features of the disclosure: Hemas gives two different figures for the same year.
| Label as printed | Figure and year | Where it appears |
| Community investments | Rs 67 Mn, FY2025/26 | Integrated Annual Report 2025/26, Economic Value-Added Statement, p.20 |
| Community investments | Rs 35 Mn, FY2024/25 | The same statement, comparative column |
| Investment in social impact project | Rs 64.5 Mn, FY2024/25 | Annual Report 2024/25, Social and Relationship Capital review |
Source: Hemas Holdings PLC, Integrated Annual Report 2025/26 p.20; Annual Report 2024/25, Social and Relationship Capital — hemas.com. Neither label is defined in either report.
If you look at it one way, community investment increased by 91% over the course of a year. If you look at it another way, the Rs 67 Mn reported for FY2025/26 is nearly the same as the Rs 64.5 Mn the company itself stated for FY2024/25, meaning the figure is essentially flat. Both interpretations cannot apply to the same amount. Furthermore, the FY2025/26 report also omits the rupee figure from its capital review. Instead, it lists the number of beneficiaries, so the two labels are no longer presented side by side in any one document.
The next difficulty is the boundary. According to the FY2025/26 report, the financial reporting boundary includes 43 legal entities, including the parent company, whereas the sustainability reporting boundary includes 20. The Rs 67 Mn figure appears in the financial statements, and 143,100+ is a sustainability metric. If you divide one by the other, you are dividing one reporting boundary by another and end up with a cost per beneficiary, which appears accurate but, in fact, has very little meaning. ESGNexus has not published such a figure for Hemas and would advise against anyone attempting to calculate one from these two figures.
Where the Disclosure Stops
| What is being measured | What Hemas publishes for FY2025/26 | Where |
| Input — money committed | Rs 67 Mn, community investments | IAR 2025/26, p.20 |
| Output — what was delivered | Six preschools added; 79 Piyawara facilities in total | IAR 2025/26, pp.12–13 |
| Output — who was reached | 143,100+ people; 30,600+ women and girls; nearly 60,000 children and teachers; 8,000+ parents | IAR 2025/26, p.6 and pp.12–13 |
| Intermediate outcome — measured change in capacity | Not disclosed | — |
| Outcome — measured change in the beneficiary’s condition | Not disclosed | — |
Source: Hemas Holdings PLC, Integrated Annual Report 2025/26 — hemas.com. Program figures are as stated in the Group CEO’s review.
The two blank rows form the core of this article. A company may spend a lot and still provide only a list of inputs and outputs; the report will fail to show this. Since Piyawara has been operating for so long and now includes so many facilities, a single outcome indicator—such as school readiness at the point of exit, attendance continuing into primary school, or any figure measured on the children rather than on the buildings—could be expressed in one line what four years of coverage figures are unable to achieve.
The report includes an independent assurance report from Ernst & Young on the GRI Universal Standards and sustainability information aligned with SLFRS. The report does not make it possible to determine whether the lives-impacted metric or the community investments item falls within that assured area, and readers should not therefore assume that it does or does not.
The Pattern Is Not Hemas’s Alone
In the Sri Lankan market, the input-and-output pattern is almost universal. The August 2026 ESGNexus review identified one published outcome metric among a sample of about 75 listed and large private companies: Union Assurance’s Suwamaga program, which was self-reported in its 2025 annual report. None of the CSR figures noted in that review are clearly covered by external assurance. A reporting practice has developed in the market in which a rupee figure and a headcount are regarded as proof of impact, and almost no one is asked for the third number.
That convention has a cost for the companies that spend seriously. A firm that shifts from wide, shallow distribution to deep, sustained programs will look, in this format, exactly like a firm that quietly cut its community work: the reach number goes down either way. Hemas may well be the first case. On the current disclosure, a reader cannot tell.
What the Next Report Could Add
1. Define what is meant by a life being impacted in a single sentence, and state whether the number refers to individuals or to contacts, whether repeat participants are counted only once or each time, and which programs contribute to the total. This information is included in the footnote of the highlights table.
2. State whether there has been a change in the counting basis. In a four-year series that decreases by about 73 percent, the decline either indicates a real change in the level of activity or reflects a change in what is being counted. A note in the restatement explaining the difference between the two situations would eliminate the uncertainty.
3. The two spending categories should be brought into agreement, or one of them should be discontinued. Currently, community investments and funding of social impact projects represent the same type of activity, measured in two different ways. There should be a single, clearly defined line maintained consistently in both the value-added statement and the capital review, so the figures are comparable year to year.
For Piyawara, publish one outcome indicator. The Hemas Outreach Foundation operates 79 preschools and has done this work for many years. It is in a better position than almost any other corporate foundation in the country to measure something relating to the children, and a single such figure would place it ahead of the whole market.
What to Watch
- In the FY2026/27 report it will be seen whether the line relating to lives affected is restated, annotated or omitted after four years of decline.
- It is unclear whether the community investments figure will reappear in the capital review alongside the value-added statement, and whether the two figures will agree.
- It is unclear whether any outcome measure applies to the Piyawara, Fems HER, or Baby Cheramy clinics.
- The boundary applicable to sustainability reporting, which currently includes 20 of 43 legal entities, will it be expanded to match the financial boundary?
ESGNexus records the information companies in Sri Lanka provide on their community investments and will include the figures for fiscal year 2026/27 in its series when they are made public. For Hemas, ESGNexus evaluates the company’s broader sustainability disclosures in its individual company disclosure profile for Hemas Holdings PLC and grades the report according to SLFRS S1 and S2. The CSR Spotlight series looks, one company at a time, at what a community investment figure actually purchases,a nd states this when the company’s report cannot
Sources & Further Reading
Hemas Holdings PLC, “Integrated Annual Report 2025/26”, 2026 — hemas.com (pp. 3, 6, 12–13, 20, 103)
Hemas Holdings PLC, “Annual Report 2024/25”, 2025 — hemas.com (pp. 9, 30–31); also filed at cdn. cse.lk
Hemas Holdings PLC, “Annual Report 2023/24”, 2024 — hemas.com (pp. 9, 21)
ESGNexus, Sri Lankan CSR disclosure review of approximately 45 listed and 30 large private companies, August 2026
Union Assurance PLC, “Annual Report 2025”, 2026 — unionassurance.com (p. 24)
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The following should be noted: The information contained in this article comes from publicly available documents. ESGNexus does not verify companies’ disclosures. Errors and omissions excepted.