Latest news

In light of the trilogue on the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD), Eumedion has today issued a statement outlining several key messages for the negotiations between the European Parliament, the European Council and the European Commission. These key messages seek to ensure both a sufficient level of ambition and a practical implementation alongside similar requirements already in place for the financial sector.

First of all, Eumedion encourages optimal alignment between the European sustainable finance legislative initiatives. Specifically, the application of the directive should be aligned with the reporting obligations under the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive. However, from a sustainability impact perspective, a lower threshold for high-risk sectors is warranted.

Eumedion would also like to see a sufficient level of ambition regarding climate action. Specifically, this means introducing the requirement for companies to have a climate transition plan, and for the European legislators to include adverse climate impacts in the scope of the due diligence requirements. Furthermore, Eumedion is of the opinion that directors of companies should take into account the consequences of their decisions for sustainability matters when fulfilling their duty to act in the best interest of the company. This would require the introduction of directors’ sustainability duties into the directive. Mindful of the fact that companies may not be able to effective deal with all adverse impacts in the supply chain at once, Eumedion also calls on the negotiators to allow for a prioritisation of impacts.

Lastly, Eumedion underlines the importance of avoiding regulatory overlap for the financial sector. Ideally, Eumedion would like to completely avoid fragmentation and overlap, by regulating due diligence activities and reporting requirements for financial market participants by the CSDDD and CSRD on the one hand (for their own operations and activities involving (in)direct business relationships), and on the other hand by the SFDR (due diligence and reporting requirements regarding investments in investee companies). If this is not possible, then Eumedion suggests an alternative approach to avoid overlap in reporting and due diligence for institutional investors.