Following the presentation by the European Commission of the new guidelines on corporate disclosure of climate information and the three reports of the Technical expert group on sustainable finance (see EUROPE 12277/20), initial reactions from stakeholders has been rather positive.
"The European Commission is right in advancing its Sustainable Finance agenda. We strongly encourage the next Commission to continue steadily on that path", Olivier Boutellis-Taft, Executive Director of Accountancy Europe, told EUROPE on Wednesday 19 June.
"Investors need high-quality, comparable and reliable company disclosures to move capital into green projects and sustainable business", he added, believing that the guidelines will support the EU taxonomy.
In his view, however, revising these non-binding guidelines is only a "first step" and mandatory guidelines would enhance transparency and ensure a level playing field.
For the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA), too, these new reporting developments are to be welcomed. "Although reporting has a role to play, good corporate governance and tax policies are equally important. The tax system, in particular, provides a way to translate the natural capital risks and dependencies into real financial consequences in the immediate and short term future," said Yen-Pei Chen, Senior Corporate Reporting and Tax manager at ACCA.
MEP Sven Giegold (Greens/EFA, Germany) also reacted and particularly welcomed the report on taxonomy in which experts recommend excluding investments in coal and nuclear energy from investments that can be considered "green".
"The Commission should follow the advice of the expert group and courageously set standards for sustainable investments worthy of the name", he said in a statement on Tuesday, 18 June.
The MEP, on the other hand, was much more critical of the report on green bonds. "The proposed European standard for green bonds does not provide any added value. The experts' recommendations are disappointing. Green bonds, whose funded projects remain opaque, open the door to greenwashing. The experts' proposal hardly goes beyond the non-binding industry standard and is therefore superfluous", he said, asking the Commission to present a better proposal.
Several other organisations are still going through the various reports. They will have the opportunity to express their views at an event organised by the Commission in Brussels on 24 June. (Original version in French by Marion Fontana)