Editorial ESG News Issue 1/2023

Dear Reader,    

The European Union's so-called “Green Deal” is having a direct impact on business practice. Since last year, the EU Taxonomy Regulation, which is an essential part of the “Action Plan for Financing Sustainable Growth”, has been in force. The aim is to direct capital flows into ecologically sustainable economic activities.   

Currently, this regulation already applies to all companies covered by the Non-Financial Reporting Directive and its German implementation in the HGB. These are essentially the large capital market-oriented companies. With the new Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD), which was published on January 5, 2023, the group of companies subject to reporting requirements and thus affected by the EU taxonomy has been significantly expanded. For larger medium-sized companies, things will get serious from 2025. In our article “The EU taxonomy in practice: what companies should know about the new regulation”, we provide you with the most important information.  

 

In addition, the EU Commission published two draft communications answering questions about the EU taxonomy at the end of December. The first part deals with the technical assessment criteria of the climate-related environmental targets; the other part on further general questions. We have summarized these FAQs for you for our ESG News issue in the article “New FAQs on EU taxonomy published – What companies need to know now”. 

 

Another area is the digitization of sustainability reporting; specifically, the design of so-called “non-financial accounting”. The content-related and technical requirements for sustainability-related data for reliable and verifiable reporting are high and can hardly be mastered without the use of digital tools. We have prepared important aspects of this topic for you in the article “Digitization in sustainability management”.  

In our article “ESG and CSR as an information vacuum cleaner – and why third parties can legally get their hands on some of the 'vacuum cleaner bag contents'”, we also explain the compliance management challenges that arise for you as a business owner in ESG and CSR reporting.  

Newly added and in future a fixed component of our ESG News is an ongoing section with news flashes from the field of ESG. Here, we highlight aspects that might be of importance to you as an entrepreneuer. 

Let us note together: ESG and sustainability reporting are here to stay. This is not a simple PR matter. The topic is multi-layered and complex. For this reason, we strongly recommend that you already start dealing with the implementation in concrete terms. We, Rödl & Partner, have also already set out on our journey and drawn up a plan on how to meet the future reporting requirements. We would be happy to discuss this with you. 

I wish you an exciting read and look forward to your feedback! 

P.S.: On October 12, 2023, our » 2nd ESG Day (in German) will take place in our Munich office. Look forward to concentrated expertise and an entrepreneurial exchange. Save the Date!