Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to the Finning International 2024 Annual Meeting. My name is James Carter, and I am the Board Chair. I would like to call this meeting to order. Now, joining me at the head table are Kevin Parkes, our President and CEO, and Jane Murdoch, our General Counsel and Chief Human Resources Officer. We are pleased to be holding our annual meeting today in person in Vancouver, and I would like to acknowledge that this meeting is being held on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territory of the Coast Salish peoples, the Tsleil-Waututh, the Squamish, and the Musqueam nations. I will start with some introductory matters and outline the order of business of this meeting.
In a minute, I will introduce our board members, and after I make those introductions, we will move on to the formal part of the meeting, when we will discuss and vote on the proposed resolutions included in the Management Proxy Circular for this meeting. In accordance with the provisions of the Canada Business Corporations Act, we will vote on the appointment of the auditors by a show of hands. For resolutions to approve the election of directors and the advisory vote on executive compensation, we will vote by ballot. To my knowledge, the proxies deposited in advance of the meeting are sufficient to pass each resolution to be considered today.
In order to expedite our meeting formalities, either I or Jane Murdoch or Kevin Parkes will move and second the required motions in our capacities as registered shareholders or proxy holders for registered shareholders of Finning. Any person who is attending this meeting as a registered shareholder or a duly appointed proxy holder may address the meeting when there is a call to discuss a motion before the meeting. Please raise your hand, and when you are called upon, you may proceed to the microphone located at the middle of the room here. Anyone who is attending this meeting as a guest will not be able to address the meeting. After we have completed voting on the business of the meeting, Kevin will give a presentation, and we will then receive the results of the ballots.
We will then conclude the meeting and continue with a question and answer session. At the start of the question and answer session, a shareholder that withdrew a proposal for the meeting will briefly comment on it, so they'll come up to do that. If you have any general questions not specifically related to the matters that are being put to a vote, we ask that you hold your question until the question and answer session. Now, if there is no objection, I will ask our General Counsel and Chief Human Resources Officer, Jane Murdoch, to act as secretary of the meeting, and Marisa Vintem of Computershare Investor Services to act as scrutineer. I will now ask the secretary to report on quorum of this meeting.
Mr. Chairman, I'm pleased to report that we have a quorum with 92 shareholders present in person or by proxy, representing 72.75% of the common shares outstanding.
As we have a quorum and have received the affidavit of mailing from our registrar and transfer agent, I declare that this meeting is regularly called and properly constituted for the transaction of business. Before proceeding with the business of the meeting, I would like to recognize Nicholas Hartery, who is retiring. Nicholas is at the, Nicky is at the front of the room here, who is retiring from our board of directors today for his contributions to the board during his ten years of service. Throughout Nicky's tenure, we have benefited greatly from his operational expertise, his regional insight into our U.K. and Ireland operations, as well as his leadership, as our Governance and Risk Committee chair over the last seven years. We thank Nicky for his dedication and service and wish him the best. Thank you, Nicky.
I would also like to acknowledge Hal Kvisle, who stepped down as Board Chair earlier this year after assuming the role in 2019. On behalf of the board and the entire company, we thank Hal for his exceptional leadership, and Hal is standing for re-election today and will retire when he reaches mandatory retirement age next year. Now to the business of the meeting. I will now introduce the members of our board of directors who are standing for re-election and our three board nominees who are standing for election for the first time. First, I will introduce our new nominees, Michael Putnam, Charles Ruigrok, and John Rhind, who will all stand for election for the first time today. Charles and John were previously appointed to the board in August of 2023 and January 2024, respectively.
As noted in our Management Proxy Circular, we are pleased to nominate to our board this year Michael Putnam, a corporate director who brings extensive business and executive leadership experience in construction and underground foundations, tunneling, and mining. Mike was most recently President and Chief Executive Officer of Skanska U.K. Plc, a leading project development and construction group active in Europe and the United States. He is based in Oxford, the United Kingdom. John Rhind, a corporate director who brings over 35 years of experience in the oil and gas industry, including executive and senior management roles at Shell Canada and Syncrude Canada. John most recently served as Chief Executive Officer and Chair of the Board of Directors of Energy Safety Canada.
He is based in Calgary, Alberta, and we are pleased to nominate for the first time Charles Ruigrok, a corporate director who brings over 30 or 40 years of experience and business and executive experience in the energy industry. Charles is chair of the board of directors of Enmax Corporation and is a former CEO of Syncrude Canada and former senior executive at Imperial Oil. He is also based in Calgary, Alberta. In addition to Mike, John, and Charles, all of our current board members, other than Nicholas Hartery, are standing for re-election. The board members standing for re-election, in addition to myself, are Vicki Avril-Groves of Cape Coral, Florida. She has been a director since 2016 and is one of our designated Audit Committee financial experts. Mary Lou Kelley of South Bend, Indiana, has been a director since 2018.
Andres Kuhlmann of Santiago, Chile, has been a director since 2019. Hal Kvisle of Calgary, Alberta, has been a director since 2017, and as mentioned, is our former board chair. Stuart Levenick of Naples, Florida, has been a director since 2016. Kevin Parkes, our President and CEO, has been a director since 2022. Edward Seraphim, or Ted Seraphim, of North Vancouver, British Columbia, has been a director since 2019. Manjit Sharma of Toronto, Ontario, has been a director since 2022 and is one of our designated audit committee financial experts. And Nancy Tower of Halifax, Nova Scotia, has been a director since 2022. Our first item of business is the presentation of our financial statements.
A copy of the 2023 financial statements, which includes Finning's financial statements for the year ended December 31st, 2023, and the auditor's report, is available via notice and access on our corporate website at finning.com and was mailed to shareholders who requested it. If there is no objection, we will dispense with reading the financial statements and auditor's report, and we'll pause for a moment to allow for any questions. As there are no objections or questions, we will proceed to the next item of business. The first matter to be voted on is the approval of the appointment of the auditor. Your board is recommending the reappointment of Deloitte LLP as Finning's auditor for the fiscal year 2024.
Jane, will you please move the motion to approve the appointment of Deloitte LLP as Finning's auditor for fiscal 2024, with their remuneration to be determined by the board of directors?
Mr. Chair, I so move.
Thank you, Jane. Kevin, would you please second the motion?
Mr. Chair, I second the motion.
Thank you, Kevin. We'll pause for a moment to allow for any questions. Seeing and hearing none, as there are no questions, I now call for a vote on the motion before the meeting, and this motion requires a simple majority to pass. So all those in favor by a show of hands, please. Okay, contrary, if any? That's passed. Thank you. The motion is carried by the requisite majority. As I mentioned earlier, we have two matters to be voted on by ballot today. The first is the approval of the Advisory Vote on Executive Compensation. As part of Finning's commitment to strong corporate governance practices, the board is providing shareholders the opportunity to cast an advisory vote on our approach to executive compensation.
The purpose of this advisory vote is to provide our shareholders with an opportunity to indicate their acceptance of the board's overall approach to executive compensation at Finning, which is described in the management proxy circular for this meeting. The text of the resolution to approve Finning's approach to executive compensation is set out on page 17 of the management proxy circular and is being projected on the screen. Jane, will you please move the motion to approve this resolution?
Mr. Chair, I so move.
Thank you, Jane. In my capacity as a registered shareholder or proxyholder for a registered shareholder, I second the motion. We'll pause for a moment to allow for any questions. Hearing none, as there are no questions, I now call for a vote on the motion before the meeting. Each shareholder or proxyholder entitled to vote on this motion has been given a ballot. If you have already voted in advance and do not wish to change your vote, no further action is required. Otherwise, please complete your ballot, and it will be collected by the scrutineer. This motion requires a simple majority to pass. Thank you. The final matter to be voted on by ballot is the election of directors. In accordance with Finning's bylaws, the board of directors has set the number of directors at 13, so today we will elect 13 directors.
In accordance with Finning's Advance Notice Bylaw, advance notice must be provided for anyone to be nominated as a director at this meeting. As no advance notice has been received, the nominees standing for election are the 13 nominees set out in the Management Proxy Circular, who I introduced to you earlier in this meeting, and whose names are being projected on the screen. Each of these nominees is nominated for election to hold office until the next annual election of directors or until their successors are appointed. Although I will be asking for one motion to elect each of the nominees, registered shareholders and proxyholders will be able to vote for or vote against each individual director. In accordance with the Canada Business Corporations Act, a director will be elected if they receive at least a majority of eligible votes in their favor.
May I have a motion to elect each of the nominees as directors of the corporation?
Mr. Chair, I so move.
Thank you, Jane. In my capacity as a registered shareholder or proxy holder for a registered shareholder, I second the motion. We'll pause for a moment to allow for any questions. Seeing and hearing none, we will proceed to a ballot vote on the election of each of the 13 director nominees. Each shareholder or proxy holder entitled to vote in this motion has been given a ballot. If you voted in advance and do not wish to change your vote, no further action is required. Otherwise, please complete your ballot and it will be collected by the scrutineer. Thank you. As all items of business have now been voted on, the results will be tabulated by the scrutineer. While we're waiting for the results of the voting, I would ask Kevin to give his presentation. So Kevin, over to you.
Thank you, Jim. Firstly, we are very pleased to officially welcome you as our new in your new role as Board Chair. Thank you, Jim. Good afternoon, everybody. As we've done in prior years, after we complete the required business of the meeting, there will be time to ask questions. To begin, I'd like to take a moment to introduce Finning's corporate officers. First, Greg Palaschuk, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer; Jane Murdoch, General Counsel and Chief Human Resources Officer; Dave Primrose, Finning Canada President; Tim Ferwerda, Finning U.K. and Ireland Managing Director; Juan Pablo Amar, Finning South America President, and Kieran Holm, Executive Vice President, Global Used Equipment. I'd also like to take a moment , and finally, Anna Marks, Senior Vice President, Finance.
At this time, I'd like to take the opportunity to acknowledge Anna, who, after 20 years of dedicated service to Finning, will be retiring in August. Thank you, Anna. I'd also like to thank the board and our leadership team for your unwavering commitment and the expertise you've provided to me and my team over the past year. Together, we've navigated challenges and seized opportunities, always striving for excellence. I'm proud to collaborate with such a talented team. Before I give my formal remarks today, I want to remind everyone that some of the information presented today will be forward-looking. This forward-looking information reflects our current expectations and is subject to risks, uncertainties and other factors, as discussed in our Annual Information Form and in our MD&A. Please treat this information with caution, as actual results may differ materially from our current expectations.
Today, I'll talk very briefly about company performance in 2023 and about our Q1 2024 results. I will also share some comments on our commitments to safety, our employees and customer experience, as well as our plans to grow our business in a sustainable way. Starting with our 2023 results, Finning demonstrated strong performance through the dedication of our 15,000 employees. They are the heart of our organization and the backbone to of our success, making a positive impact on each other, our customers, and the communities in which we work. I'll talk more about our amazing team in a few moments. We began 2023 with strong momentum around product support growth. We built upon this by sharing our updated strategy at our Investor Day in Chile in September, which guides the execution of our strategy. Product support growth remains our principal priority.
We added operational resilience and sustainable growth as new priorities, which allow us-- which allowed us, at the end of the year, with a strong financial position and a healthy equipment backlog. Turning to our most recent financial performance, we released our fiscal 2024 Q1 financial results yesterday. In these results, you will see, continued momentum around the execution of our strategy. I was particularly pleased with the strong execution of our used equipment strategy, which has driven increased participation in a very active market, whilst also demonstrating resilience and helping offset some of the impact of lower product support sales in the quarter. We're also pleased with importantly strategic wins, which we accomplished in each region in April, including multiple copper mines in Chile, oil sands in Canada, and data centers in the U.K. and Ireland.
These awards represent over CAD 700 million of new equipment orders, delivery starting in the second half of this year. They engage a solid foundation for product support opportunities in the future. As discussed previously, with electrification trends driving strong copper demand, Chile is mobilizing for growth. We are very pleased with the large orders in April, including in Codelco, whose order was valued at CAD 380 million, where the fleet will be supported by a 10-year maintenance and repair contract. This is an important strategic win for Finning and Caterpillar. This new agreement covers four Codelco mines and marks the first time Caterpillar trucks will be deployed in two of those mines. Building equipment population and increasing our proportion of contracted revenue are key to our strategy, and this win is an excellent example.
We are also pleased to increase our dividend by 10%, marking our 23rd consecutive year of growth. This increase is well supported by our improved earnings capacity and demonstrates our strong commitment to returning capital to shareholders. As we move forward, we are approaching the remainder of the fiscal year with optimism. I'm confident our strategic efforts are yielding results, and we're well-positioned to take advantage of improving market conditions. As I mentioned previously, our people are our greatest competitive advantage, and we are committed to ensuring we build safe and supportive workplaces. We are working hard to simplify our business and empower our teams to build customer loyalty. We increased our focus on eliminating serious incidents by engaging our frontline teams to build a serious injury and fatality program. We refer to this as SIF.
This program helps us to prioritize the prevention and mitigation of high-potential hazards. We are pleased to see the frequency of significant incidents decrease, with zero significant incidents in the first quarter of 2024. We remain committed to creating a culture and a work environment where everybody who works for Finning feels safe, valued and included. Our investment in employee training is critical to building the capabilities we need to execute our strategy and serve our customers. In 2023, we delivered employee training programs in three streams: technical, sales, and leadership. During this time, we increased the amount of technical training offered hours offered by 59%. We became one of 20 Caterpillar dealers to receive Sales Career Development Process accreditation, and over 1,300 leaders participated in our Powering Up Frontline Leader training program. Sustainability is integral to our everyday operations, strategies, and our long-term plans.
We work continuously to improve our sustainability performance and help our customers enhance theirs. We have robust programs to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from our facilities and our fleet, prevent and control spills, and reduce waste generated by our operations. We remain on track to achieve our goal of reducing our GHG emissions by 40% by 2027 from our 2017 baseline. Sourcing more electricity from renewable sources is a critical path, and we are pleased with our progress. We're also proud of participating in Cat's Early Learner program. This is a pilot program for a fully electric drive trucks, which we hope to have in our region soon. Finning also provides power solutions for primary and backup power and for heating, which helps our customers reduce their GHG emissions.
We are also very proud of our OEM remanufacturing facility, which helps us extend the life of critical components, reusing more and more original parts and further reducing our impact on the environment. I encourage you to read our 2023 sustainability report, which will be released on our website soon, to learn more about how we are reducing the impact on the environment, creating meaningful, inclusive employment opportunities, and creating a positive impact on the communities in which we work. Looking ahead, our team is committed to the execution of our strategy, and we are focused on growing our business in a moderated growth environment by driving product support, building full-cycle resilience, and delivering sustainable growth in used rental and power systems.
The execution of our strategy and improving market conditions will have an increasing impact as we move through the year, with improving product support, growth rates, strong free cash flow generation for the balance of this year. In closing, I want to thank our employees, our customers, and our shareholders, and our partners for their support during the past year. Your loyalty and commitment have been key to our success. I'll now turn the meeting back over to Jim to provide the results of the shareholder votes and conclude the formal part of our meeting and open our question-and-answer session. Jim?
Well, thank you, Kevin. We now have the voting results for the Advisory Vote on Executive Compensation and the election of the 13 directors. I will ask Jane to provide the voting results.
97.43% of eligible votes in favor and 2.57% against, and all directors were elected individually, with each director receiving at least 94.6% of eligible votes in favor.
Thank you, Jane. I declare the resolution carried by the required simple majority, and I confirm that all of the nominees for election as directors of the corporation received more votes for their election than votes against, and therefore, the nominees are declared elected as directors. There being no further business, this concludes the formal portion of our meeting, and I now declare the annual meeting concluded. We will now move into a question-and-answer session. I will now ask Emma Pullman to present a statement on behalf of the British Columbia General Employees' Union, or BCGEU, for their shareholder proposal that was withdrawn. Emma, please feel free to comment.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. So just to reiterate, my name is Emma, and I'm the head of shareholder engagement for the BC General Employees' Union, and we are long-term Finning shareholders, and it is our first time engaging with Finning. Finning's business is geographically diversified but also dependent on growth in South America. Finning has a unique business model as the premier distributor and servicer of heavy machinery equipment in the mining, construction, oil and gas, and defense sectors. This unique business model requires a thoughtful and structured approach to assess and mitigate the potential for adverse human rights impacts throughout Finning's business. The business world has acknowledged that the accepted guide for assessing and mitigating such risks are the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, also known as the UNGPs.
The Canadian government has taken steps to promote the adoption of the UNGPs by Canadian companies doing business abroad. Human rights due diligence is good not only for protecting human rights along the value chain, but also essential for long-term value creation for issuers and their investors. Through our shareholder proposal, the BCGEU requested that Finning adopt a human rights policy informed by the UNGPs. During our engagement, Finning expressed a willingness to assess its human rights assessment and mitigation practices, and Finning agreed to conduct a review of its existing policies and practices related to human rights risk management. As a result of this, we were able to withdraw our proposal, and we look forward to meeting with Finning to discuss the results of this review.
We remain ready to engage Finning and its shareholders should it become evident that Finning's human rights risk management practices require further refinement in order to bring Finning into alignment with other businesses with global operations. And again, we thank you for the engagement.
Thank you, Emma, for your comments, and on behalf of Finning, we thank BCGEU for the productive engagement. For shareholders, please note that we have presented the company's views in the proxy circular, so in the interest of time, we will not repeat them now. I will now open the floor for questions from shareholders. Please raise your hand if you have a question, and when you are called upon, proceed to the microphone in the middle of the room. It says at the back of the room here, but I think they mean the middle of the room.
So, we will allow some time for questions if there are any. Seeing and hearing none, that concludes our question- and- answer session. We appreciate the strong show of support seen here today, and on behalf of Finning and our board of directors, we thank you for joining us. Thank you all very much for being here. I think we can terminate the meeting now.