Responsabilité sociale des entreprises | Page 4
Divulgation Gouvernance mission et composition du conseil d'administration Responsabilité sociale des entreprises
Et le « E » des ESG ?
Ivan Tchotourian 9 juillet 2020 Ivan Tchotourian
Voilà une belle question abordée dans ce billet du Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance « What Board Members Need to Know about the “E” in ESG » (par Sheila M. Harvey, Reza S. Zarghamee et Jonathan M. Ocker, 9 juillet 2020) !
Extrait concernant les CA :
Board Responsibilities
Traditionally, a company’s board will manage corporate governance risks and executive compensation. The practical need to expand these responsibilities to account for environmental stewardship and risk management is a relatively new phenomenon, and many boards are not yet up to speed.
The first step toward properly addressing environmental matters is for the board to collaborate with management to identify the different ways in which the company’s businesses and operations interface with environmental issues. The aim here is to think expansively. For purposes of ESG, environmental matters extend beyond regulatory compliance and impacts on natural resources to include concepts such as environmental justice, carbon footprints, supply chains and product stewardship.
Consistent with this approach, an equally broad realm of potential environmental risks also should be considered. These may include the potential to cause environmental contamination and natural resource damages, which may trigger not just cleanup liabilities but also disclosure requirements in financial statements. Also relevant is the potential for business operations to be disrupted by environmental factors such as climate change.
Once potential environmental risks are identified, assessments should be made regarding their materiality and the existence of standing corporate policies and procedures to address them. Where such policies are lacking, they should be developed and implemented. Moreover, determinations should be made about how the company will present itself to investors, regulators and society to adequately inform them of potential environmental risks, avoid reputational harm and increase long-term value.
There is no one-size-fits-all solution, and companies have different environmental profiles. Each will have to find its own way, but the board should make sure that management devotes the appropriate resources to addressing environmental matters, understands environmental disclosure requirements and standards and ranking systems, and takes a proactive approach to protecting the company’s reputation from an environmental standpoint.
This is a multifaceted paradigm that requires open lines of communication between management and the board at all times. Moreover, because not every board member can be an ESG expert, we recommend that the appropriate committee be tasked in its charter with spearheading the environmental risk area for the board.
Points à retenir :
- Corporate boards should partner with management to ensure appropriate and regular oversight of environmental issues critical to the long-term economic success and reputation of the company.
- Either the board or an authorized committee should receive briefings on environmental matters/risks that may jeopardize a company’s reputation and corrective action undertaken to address those risks.
- Management should monitor environmental disclosures and rankings of peer firms and consult with the board on how to improve their company’s standing relative to competing firms and in terms of stakeholder expectations.
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Divulgation divulgation extra-financière Gouvernance Responsabilité sociale des entreprises
Reporting non-financier : s’inspirer du modèle européen
Ivan Tchotourian 7 juillet 2020 Ivan Tchotourian
Discussion intéressante sur le reporting non-financier de G. Tsagas et C. Villiers « Why ‘Less is More’ in non-Financial Reporting Initiatives: Concrete Steps Towards Supporting Sustainability » (Oxford Business Law Blog, 10 juin 2020).
Conclusion :
Random and arbitrary compliance with various initiatives makes companies’ sustainable practices ‘less’ rather than ‘more’ transparent. Our paper offers a comprehensive view on different reporting frameworks. It shows that there is a need to provide some clarity in this complex landscape. Fundamentally, the current reporting landscape is unlikely to impact positively on efforts towards sustainability. We suggest in our paper hat the scope of the NFRD, as the most promising of the existing initiatives, should be revisited so as to enhance its contribution to furthering corporations’ sustainable practices. Our paper supports reform of the NFRD which has constituted a positive step in the right direction. What is required now is stronger guidance on what to report and how to report it. Steps are being taken in the right direction towards clarifying metrics around sustainability (World Economic Forum 2020). A standardized and streamlined framework is necessary in order to pin companies down to something more concrete, rather than giving them too much choice on which guidelines, frameworks or recommendations they may opt to follow. Stronger, clearer and more concrete definitions of key concepts are required, as well as clarification of the rights of stakeholders in this area of activity. Proposals for reform that have arisen, with a consultation exercise by the European Commission, (European Commission Consultation 2020) are therefore to be welcomed. We suggest an expansion of the NFRD’s scope and that it represent sustainability as a positive instead of reducing the focus only to negative risks. EU member states and companies should have opportunities for effective compliance with the reporting requirements, with the NFRD better defining the concepts it refers to.
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actualités canadiennes Base documentaire Divulgation doctrine Gouvernance Normes d'encadrement rémunération Responsabilité sociale des entreprises
Pour un ratio d’équité au Canada
Ivan Tchotourian 5 juillet 2020 Ivan Tchotourian
Bonjour à toutes et à tous, voici une intéressante tribune parue dans The Globe and Mail : « Why Canada should adopt pay ratio disclosures » (19 avril 2020).
Extrait :
In particular, securities regulators should make pay ratio disclosures mandatory to improve transparency of executive pay packages at public companies. Pay ratio disclosures reveal the difference in the total remuneration between a company’s top executives and its rank and file workers….
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Divulgation divulgation extra-financière divulgation financière Gouvernance normes de droit parties prenantes Responsabilité sociale des entreprises
SEC : une réponse à sa consultation sur la divulgation en matière de risque COVID-19
Ivan Tchotourian 4 juillet 2020 Ivan Tchotourian
Par la voix de Carter Dougherty, l’Americans for Financial Reform a adressé sa réponse à la SEC à propos de la divulgation obligatoire du risque COVID-19 : « SEC Should Mandate Disclosures on COVID-19 Risks and Responses » (1er juillet 2020).
Extrait :
The impact of the losses on shareholders will be significant. Investors, however, are being forced to rely on news reports to try to understand how the crisis is impacting companies in their portfolios and how those companies are responding. The SEC must act to require companies to provide consistent, reliable data to investors about the economic impact of the pandemic on their business, human capital management practices, and supply chain risks. These disclosures should include:
- Workplace COVID-19 Prevention and Control Plan—Companies should disclose a written infectious disease prevention and control plan including information such as the company’s practices regarding hazard identification and assessment, employee training, and provision of personal protective equipment.
- Identification, Contact Tracing, and Isolation—Companies should disclose their policies for identifying employees who are infected or symptomatic, contact tracing and notification for potentially exposed employees and customers, and leave policies for infected employees who are isolating.
- Compliance with Quarantine Orders and phased reopening orders—Companies should disclose how they are complying with federal, state, and local government quarantine orders and public health recommendations to limit operations.
- Financial Implications—Companies should disclose the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on their cash flows and balance sheet as well as steps taken to preserve liquidity such as accessing credit facilities, government assistance, or the suspension of dividends and stock buybacks.
- Executive Compensation—Companies should promptly disclose the rationale for any material modifications of senior executive compensation due to the COVID-19 pandemic, including changes to performance targets or issuance of new equity compensation awards.
- Employee Leave—Companies should disclose whether or not they provide paid sick leave to encourage sick workers to stay home, paid leave for quarantined workers, paid leave at any temporarily closed facilities, and family leave options to provide for childcare or sick family
- Health Insurance—Companies should disclose the health insurance coverage ratio of their workforce and whether the company has a policy to provide employer-paid health insurance for any employees who are laid off during the COVID-19 pandemic.
- Contingent Workers—Companies should disclose if part-time employees, temporary workers, independent contractors, and subcontracted workers receive all the protections and benefits provided to full-time company employees, including those outlined above.
- Supply Chains-Companies should disclose whether they are current on payments to their supply chain vendors. Timely and prompt payments to suppliers will help retain suppliers’ workforces and ensure that a stable supply chain is in place for business operations going forward.
- Workers’ Rights-Companies should disclose their policies for protecting employees who raise concerns about workplace health and safety from retaliation, including whistleblower protections and contractual provisions protecting workers’ rights to raise concerns about workplace conditions.
- Political activity—Companies should disclose all election spending and lobbying activity, especially money spent through third parties like trade associations and social welfare 501(c)4 organizations.
Prior to the onset of COVID-19, it was often argued that human rights, worker protection and supply chain matters were moral issues not relevant to a company’s financial performance. As millions of workers are laid off and supply chains unravel, the pandemic has proven that view wrong. Businesses that protect workers and consumers will be better positioned to continue operations and respond to consumer demand throughout the pandemic. The disclosures outlined above will provide investors with important information to help them understand how COVID-19 is impacting the companies they are invested in. In addition, by requiring these disclosures, the Commission has the opportunity to encourage companies to review their current practices and consider whether updates are necessary in light of recent events. The process of preparing these disclosures may help some public companies to recognize that their current practices are not sufficiently robust to protect their workers, consumers, supply chains and, as a result, their investors’ capital given the impact of the pandemic.
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actualités internationales Divulgation divulgation extra-financière finance sociale et investissement responsable Gouvernance Normes d'encadrement Responsabilité sociale des entreprises
Il faut améliorer l’information non financière
Ivan Tchotourian 6 juin 2020 Ivan Tchotourian
Pour M. Ben Aamar et Mme Martinez, il faut que les entreprises doivent dépasser le « greenwashing » pour informer les investisseurs sur la résilience de leur modèle économique aux chocs environnementaux. Je vous invite à lire leur tribune : « Améliorer l’information environnementale des investisseurs doit devenir une priorité « (Le Monde, 5 juin 2020).
Extrait :
La pandémie actuelle peut aboutir à une prise de conscience collective et à un renforcement de la lutte contre les causes du dérèglement climatique, ou bien, au contraire, à une mise entre parenthèses des initiatives en ce sens, car l’attention ainsi que toutes les ressources financières seront consacrées à des mesures de relance économique. La cause climatique passerait alors au second plan face à l’urgence, avec, à terme, des conséquences désastreuses.
Le rôle des gouvernants est majeur. Mais pour orienter correctement les flux financiers, publics comme privés, améliorer l’information environnementale des investisseurs doit également devenir une priorité. Le sujet est peu connu du grand public car d’apparence technique. Pourtant, les enjeux sont considérables.
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Divulgation divulgation extra-financière Normes d'encadrement normes de droit normes de marché Nouvelles diverses Responsabilité sociale des entreprises
Reporting extra-financier : présentation des référentiels
Ivan Tchotourian 10 avril 2020 Ivan Tchotourian
M. Cornet propose un document très intéressant sur le reporting extra-financier : une synthèse de tous les référentiels avec les grandes caractéristiques de chacun. Un document très utile ! À consulter : « Les principaux référentiels de reporting extrafinancier dans le monde ».
Je copie-colle le billet de blogue…
Extrait :
En pièce jointe, un tableau de synthèse actualisé sur les principaux référentiels de reporting extrafinancier et référentiels intégrant un volet ou des recommandations sur le reporting extrafinancier.
Réalisé pour les étudiants.es de l’Institut Léonard de Vinci MBA Management de la RSE et Performance des Organisations (MARPO), partagé aujourd’hui avec vous.
Outre son exhaustivité, il illustre la grande diversité des approches.
S’il existe sur le sujet des luttes de territoires et une volonté de réglementer, une étude approndie montre que bon nombre de principes sont quasi universels… Contextualisation, Inclusivité, Matérialité, Exhaustivité, Fiabilité, Clarté, etc…
Et que le point central, c’est la matérialité…
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actualités internationales Divulgation finance sociale et investissement responsable Normes d'encadrement Nouvelles diverses Responsabilité sociale des entreprises
La fin du greenwashing dans les produits financiers ?
Ivan Tchotourian 13 mars 2020 Ivan Tchotourian
L’AMF France vient de publier une première doctrine en matière d’information des investisseurs dans le domaine des produits financiers : Recommandation DOC-2020-03 : Informations à fournir par les placements collectifs intégrant des approches extra-financières. Voilà une bonne nouvelle pour la RSE ! À quand au Québec ?
Extrait :
Chargée de veiller au caractère clair, exact et non trompeur de l’information communiquée aux investisseurs, l’AMF publie une doctrine visant à assurer une proportionnalité entre la réalité de la prise en compte des facteurs extra-financiers dans la gestion et la place qui leur est réservée dans la communication aux investisseurs. Une meilleure lisibilité de l’offre renforcera la protection des épargnants au moment où ces derniers démontrent un intérêt grandissant pour les placements qui mettent en avant la prise en compte de critères extra-financiers.
Les fonds qui souhaitent mettre en avant cette prise en compte de critères extra-financiers comme un élément central de communication devront respecter des standards minimaux précisés par cette doctrine et notamment justifier d’une approche fondée sur un engagement significatif tel que défini ci-dessous.
Des objectifs mesurables de prise en compte de critères extra-financiers devront figurer dans les documents réglementaires tels que le prospectus. Ces objectifs mesurables devront être significatifs pour assurer une réelle distinction entre les approches. Ainsi, pour les approches dites « Best-in Class » – les plus utilisées par les gérants -, des seuils quantitatifs issus du label ISR français seront utilisés comme référence pour juger du caractère significatif de l’engagement. Par exemple, les approches en « sélectivité » devront s’engager sur une réduction minimale de 20 % des émetteurs disposant de la moins bonne note ESG de l’univers d’investissement. Pour les autres approches, les sociétés de gestion devront être en mesure de démontrer au régulateur en quoi l’engagement retenu est significatif.
La doctrine s’applique immédiatement pour les nouveaux placements collectifs, les modifications de placements collectifs existants et pour les nouvelles notifications à l’AMF de la commercialisation en France d’un OPCVM étranger. Concernant les produits existants, la mise à jour de la dénomination, documentation commerciale et le DICI doit se faire d’ici fin novembre 2020.
À la prochaine…
