The European Financial Reporting Advisory Group (EFRAG) announced on Monday 16 November that it had delivered its progress report to the European Commission about its preparatory work on the potential development of European non-financial reporting standards (see EUROPE 12512/16).
At the end of June, the Commission asked EFRAG to provide technical advice in case the EU decides to develop non-financial reporting standards as part of revision of the non-financial reporting directive in 2021 (see EUROPE 12430/22).
The preparatory work is being carried out by a multi-stakeholder working group (see EUROPE 12554/21) led by Patrick de Cambourg, the current President of the French Accounting Standards Authority and former Chairman of the Mazars Group.
The report sets out the activities carried out by the working group up to 31 October, the roadmap it has developed, and the results of the preliminary assessment.
In particular, it notes that the establishment of a “well-defined set of principles and relevant, reliable and comparable non-financial data, aligned with EU policies, is a prerequisite for the success of the current momentum in EU non-financial disclosure-related policies”.
The preparatory work has also identified the fact that there are already a large number of non-financial reporting standardisation initiatives in existence. Almost a hundred relevant initiatives have been identified and are currently undergoing detailed analysis by the working group.
According to the report, this situation illustrates a significant and growing trend towards development of new benchmarks for non-financial reporting.
The report points out, however, that the variety of approaches and viewpoints also makes choices and implementation difficult and costly for reporting entities and hinders reliability and comparability.
The EFRAG working group is expected to deliver its final report in early 2021. The progress report can be found at: https://bit.ly/2Uyjz5p (Original version in French by Marion Fontana)