Daewoo, South Korean steelmaker Posco and Malaysian groups Genting and IJM were targeted in Monday’s divestment decision by Norway’s central bank, which manages the wealth fund that owns around 1.3 per cent of all stocks on global equity markets, with stakes in about 9,000 companies.

Norway’s biggest sovereign wealth fund has decided to divest its stakes from four Asian companies, driven by environmental concerns linked to their palm oil projects in Indonesia. The two Malaysian companies also have palm oil operations.

Bhd and Genting Bhd, due to “risk of severe environmental damage”, it said in a statement.

The fund takes into account ethical rules encompassing human rights, some weapons production, the environment and tobacco.

The decisions by the fund – which draws investment money from Norway’s huge oil revenues, a fact that has not escaped some detractors – are frequently replicated by other worldwide investors that are also concerned about ethical perceptions of their holdings.

The report added that the exclusions followed a recommendation by the fund’s Council of Ethics, which said the firms or their subsidiaries were involved in the destruction of rainforests in Indonesia and Malaysia. Neither Daewoo nor PT BIA are members of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil, the Council noted.

The fund’s shares in those four companies totalled 2.2 billion Norwegian crowns (US$270 million) at the beginning of 2015. The $870 billion fund (AU$1186 billion) said the current sell off and policy shifts from China’s leadership will not affect its long-term view on the second-biggest economy in the world and it will continue to increase investment, reports Bloomberg.