During the week of 5/9th of September, the fourth edition of the "Sustainability week" organised by the Italian Stock Exchange took place, with the participation of the major investment funds, advisors and corporate companies engaged today in investment processes to facilitate the transition towards a sustainable economy.
The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted by all United Nations Member States in 2015, provides a shared blueprint for peace and prosperity for people and the planet, now and into the future. At its heart are the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which are an urgent call for action by all countries - developed and developing - in a global partnership.
If the beginning of the year 2022 has brought great innovations in the development of legislative issues concerning the financial disclosure envisaged by many companies in the process of due diligence in the area of sustainability, this is largely due to the European Union's proposal concerning the 'Corporate sustainability due diligence directive', CSDD for short, published last February 2022.
The Sustainability reporting, introduced for European companies with the EU Directive 95/2014, represents to date in the international reporting landscape, the starting point of a continuously evolving path that aims to meet numerous challenges, first and foremost the integrated management of non-financial information, structured in a framework that can be as comprehensive as possible, to be placed alongside classic financial reporting.
It has become increasingly fashionable in recent years, within corporate governance policies, to emphasise a corollary of measures and principles, as defined by GRI 405 or the SASB method, a cornerstone of human capital and its related management: inclusion, diversity and equal opportunities policies.
When one thinks of an economic system in harmony with nature and the land, the shape of the circle always comes to mind, of the interconnection and nature that from a source becomes capital and then returns to transform itself into ever new elements.
The scope of European Union legislation, in the field of accelerating and harmonizing rules on sustainable finance, has expanded considerably in the past few years and is gradually broadening.
They are defined as characteristics, or criteria, but also as aspects and risks: in these and other ways it is tried to give a definition to the three pillars of sustainability: Environmental, Social and Governance, in an acronym: "ESG."
The state of the art of European legislation aimed at defining the legislative framework for sustainable investment is certainly the most advanced and defined in the global landscape at present.
While it is true that today ESG issues, the Environment, Social and Governance characteristics inherent in every type of business, are increasingly high on the priorities in the agendas of the boards of major organizations, carbon footprint is certainly among the most important issues in the field of sustainability.