Gouvernance | Page 6

Dans Corporate Knight, Rick Spence propose un article revenant sur la vigilance des entreprises et la nécessité d’avancer sur le dossier : « Is Canada a dumping ground for products made with Xinjiang forced labour? » (28 septembre 2022).

Résumé :

The report was welcomed by activists who feel the Uyghur cause has been soft-pedalled by world leaders. And it caused a commotion in Canada, as advocates pushed the Liberal government to punish China for crimes against humanity. “China’s human rights violations exceed anything the world has seen since the Third Reich,” says Clive Ansley, an immigration and human-rights lawyer who advises the Toronto-based Uyghur Rights Advocacy Project (URAP).  

Mehmet Tohti, the executive director of URAP, demanded action on both diplomatic and business fronts. “Canada has yet to prevent even a single shipment of products tainted by Uyghur forced labour from entering Canada,” he said in a statement for “Uyghur Action Day.” “As a result, Canada has become a dumping ground for such products.” 

For her part, Minister of Foreign Affairs Mélanie Joly offered her government’s “grave concern with the ongoing gross and systemic human rights violations in Xinjiang.”  

But with Canada buying three times more goods and services from China than it sells, Ansley believes Canada has less to lose than China does from any hiccup in trade.  

So far, only the U.S. has dared accuse China of genocide. If Ottawa joined Washington in confronting China, Ansley thinks other Western allies might jolt into action. China doesn’t want a showdown with North America and Europe, he says: “Courage is a great thing, and I would love to see the Canadian government take a stand.” 

À la prochaine…

Je reprends une partie du titre d’un article que j’invite nos lectrices et lecteurs à lire : « Allégation et greenwashing : vendre du faux durable devient un risque juridique coûteux » (par Catherine Husson Traore, novethic essentiel, 24 juin 2022). Intéressant axe pour s’assurer de la véracité des démarches de RSE…

Extrait :

« Pratiques commerciales trompeuses« . C’est ce dont Zero Waste France accuse Adidas et New Balance. L’ONG vient de déposer plainte contre les deux entreprises, en s’appuyant sur les articles L. 121-2 et suivants du code de la Consommation, qui font des fausses allégations environnementales un délit passible d’une peine de deux ans d’emprisonnement et d’une amende de 300 000 euros ou plus.

À suivre donc !

À la prochaine…

Les professeurs Ferrarini et Zhu se pose une question bien intéressante que je relaie ici : « Is There a Role for Benefit Corporations in the New Sustainable Governance Framework? » (30 mai 2021, European Corporate Governance Institute – Law Working Paper No. 588/2021). À cette question, ils répondent de manière prudente. Un article à découvrir…

Résumé :

In this paper, we ask whether benefit corporations have a role to play in the emerging EU sustainable governance framework. In sec. 2, we briefly introduce the benefit corporation with regard to US law and to the laws of some EU member States, such as France and Italy, which have adopted this company form. In sec. 3, we focus on the benefit corporation’s purpose and function from a comparative law perspective, asking whether benefit corporations perform a useful function internationally. We argue that corporate purpose tends to be a flexible concept across countries and that benefit corporations are not the only way to reconcile profit and social values in business corporations.

In sec. 4, we compare the critical features of the law relating to benefit corporations with the essential elements of the emerging sustainable governance framework. We show that the latter partially overlaps with the laws on benefit corporations and to some extent is a substitute for them, therefore reducing the potential interest in this corporate form.

In sec. 5, we conclude that mainly firms which the new EU sustainable governance framework does not apply to, such as non-listed SMEs, will adopt the benefit corporation model when available in their jurisdiction, while other companies may still adopt it mostly for communicating their commitment to sustainability.

À la prochaine…

Énorme nouvelle qui touche les institutions financières !

Le Bureau du surintendant des institutions financières (BSIF) publie aujourd’hui une version à l’étude de la ligne directrice B-15, Gestion des risques climatiques. Celle-ci propose un cadre prudentiel plus sensible aux changements climatiques et reconnaît l’incidence de ces changements sur la gestion des risques. Elle énonce également les attentes du BSIF à l’égard des institutions financières fédérales.

La ligne directrice est consultable : ici.

Pour en savoir plus sur cette nouvelle, ainsi que sur les rapports sous-jacents à cette nouvelle : ici.

À la prochaine…