05 December 2019

ACCA: Green New Deal, Sustainable Finance & the role of corporate governance & reporting - how integration and impact are the way forward

International and EU experts discussed the contribution of corporate governance and reporting to the Green New Deal and called for global and concerted action at a joint ACCA-IIRC-CFA Institute conference in Brussels.

Sustainability and a Green New Deal are at the heart of the EuropeanCommission’s forthcoming programme. This demands unprecedented modernisation and change from all parts of our economies, globally. Sustainable finance can play a fundamental role in this, and businesses and their finance teams are also increasingly called upon to monitor and report on social and environmental risks and improve business models to redefine how they create value.

To shine a much needed spotlight on what has been achieved and the work ahead, ACCA, the IIRC and CFA Institute organised a lively discussion on the crucial role of corporate governance and reporting, and how integration and impact are the way forward. Also launched at this Brussels-based event was the joint ACCA-CFA Institute report called Social and environmental value creation, which examines the role that business and finance is fulfilling in meeting these new challenges.

Jonathan Labrey, Chief Strategy Officer at the IIRC opened the conference saying:”Perhaps the most striking trend of all is the change within mainstream capital market thinking - investors, business and regulators.  There is a much greater focus on putting societal interests at the heart of the purpose of companies - in corporate governance codes and in market practice.  And a genuine and much needed realignment of corporate purpose towards the needs of broader society will influence reporting and governance and achieve higher performance and increased trust which will benefit all parts of the value chain”.

Most of the speakers agreed that transformational - or systemic - change is needed, but this will only happen through taking actions or changing behaviour. Improving sustainability reporting will involve responding to challenges related to availability and comparability of data and metrics, require clarifying sustainable finance definitions and face methodological issues associated with scenario analysis and stress testing. Corporate reporting and accounting also urgently needs to factor other environmental factors than climate change like biodiversity, and better disclosure requires moving to due diligence reporting models. At the moment we are shifting risks from one sector to another, but we need to look at the total environmental impact, and to have in place: Governance - Risk Management - Meaningful reporting and Measurement - set targets - and plan/ implement actions.

Full press release on ACCA

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