12 November 2021

BEUC: Consumer perspective on the proposal for a Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive

Mandatory sustainability reporting standards would give consumers more clarity about the sustainability of their investments, and help to support the transition towards a more resilient, low-carbon economy.

Why it matters to consumers

Consumers increasingly care about the impact of their investments on the world.

However, consumers investing into specific companies also often lack sufficient

information about their sustainability impact. Investors and financial services providers

offering such products often struggle to access comparable and reliable sustainability

information of the companies in which they invest. Mandatory sustainability reporting

standards would give consumers more clarity about the sustainability of their

investments, and help to support the transition towards a more resilient, low-carbon

economy.

Summary

BEUC strongly welcomes the proposal for a Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive

(CSRD). It features several improvements civil society representatives have been calling

for and by and large reflects the recommendations issued by the European Financial

Reporting Advisory Group (EFRAG), earlier this year.

Despite the improvements, a few gaps in the reporting regime have not been sufficiently

addressed in the proposal. To close these gaps and truly make progress towards

transparent sustainable finance markets, the following measures are necessary:

1. All listed companies and all companies in high-impact sectors, including non-EU

companies whose securities are admitted to trading in the EU must be included in

the scope of sustainability reporting.

2. Businesses create different sustainability risks according to their activities. Mining,

for example may have very different consequences than producing textiles. The

non-financial statement must be tailored to the business risk. This applies to the

potential harm caused through the activity and the risk incurred due to changing

environmental factors like floods, for example. This means that the reporting must

be specific to the risk profile of a company, to be relevant to (retail-) investors.

3. The CSRD includes a mandate to create European mandatory sustainability

reporting standards. When these are being developed, they should cover all aspects

of sustainability reporting mandated by the level 1 text. In particular, this needs to

include reporting standards for the 1.5 °C objective.

BEUC

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