10 years of CSR reporting in Poland

6 lutego 2017

For the last 10 years, the Responsible Business Forum has partnered with Deloitte in the organization of the CSR Reports Competition, devised to popularise non-financial reporting and to showcase relevant good corporate practices. Every year, the jury selects companies which engage in a dialogue with stakeholders and clearly, transparently and credibly present their accomplishments in the reports they publish. On the occasion of the round anniversary of the first edition of the competition, a video and an infographic have been prepared to review the last decade of non-financial reporting in Poland.

Infographic

Video

The CSR Reports competition is the first initiative of its kind in Poland. For ten years now, it has been helping to assess how non-financial data, including ESG (E – environmental, S – social and G – governance) components, is disclosed. The jury, made up of business community experts, NGOs and government institutions, selects companies which engage in a dialogue with stakeholders and clearly, transparently and credibly present their accomplishments in the reports they publish.  The winning reports are selected in the following categories: main prize and best debut (where winners are chosen by the expert jury), as well as journalists’ and Internet users’ prizes. Special mentions are also awarded.  For more information, visit: raportyspoleczne.pl

From the beginning of the CSR Reports Competition, the Responsible Business Forum has been the co-organizer of the project, thus supporting the advancement of non-financial reporting in Poland. The anniversary edition of the competition coincides with the work of Polish authorities on the implementation of the ground-breaking EU directive regarding the disclosure of non-financial and diversity information by certain large companies and groups. We hope that this will contribute to increased transparency and corporate social responsibility, both in the business circles and in the wider environment, so that we can all build our future with the next generation in mind,- says Mirella Panek-Owsiańska, President of the Responsible Business Forum and the Head of the Main Jury of the CSR Reports Competition.

– We can see that increasingly more companies are embracing non-financial and integrated reporting. This type of reporting offers them an opportunity to have a more holistic and strategic overview of their organizations, evaluate their impact on the economic and social surrounding, as well as on the environment. It may also provide firms with new business opportunities. Moreover, financial and non-financial data transparency makes companies more credible among internal and external stakeholders. I hope that since from the beginning of 2017 large public interest entities in the EU are required to disclose non-financial data and diversity information other companies will follow their path and thus strengthen the condition of Polish and Central European businesses – says Irena Pichola, a Deloitte partner and the Leader of Sustainability Consulting Central Europe.

 A Decade of Reporting

The official CSR Reports anniversary gala was an opportunity to look back at the ten years of non-financial reporting by Polish companies, as well as to analyse the ongoing changes and new trends.

The number of reporting companies has been increasing steadily since 2007. This is also evidenced by the nearly three-fold increase in the number of CSR reports entered into the competition (11 in 2007 as opposed to 32 in 2016). The number of reporting non-business organizations is also growing – this year five such reports were entered, which is a record number in the history of the project.
The vast majority of reports are already drafted in accordance with the GRI guidelines and companies increasingly often opt for integrated reports, i.e. a single publication with both financial and non-financial data, based on international guidelines. Seeking to enhance the credibility of their non-financial or integrated reports, companies rely on third-party data verification. Importantly, more and more of them place corporate social responsibility (CSR) at the core of their strategy. Information about the changes and trends in social reporting have been summarized in the infographic prepared for the competition anniversary (attached) and in a video which looks back at the ten years of CSR reporting in Poland and is available here.

All CSR reports which have been entered into the competition in the course of its history are available from http://raportyspoleczne.pl/biblioteka-raportow/ .

32 reports were entered into the 10th edition, including 8 by first-time entrants, 7 integrated reports and 5 reports from non-business institutions. Among the entries, the Main Jury, the Journalists’ Jury, Internet users, the Ministry of Economic Development and the Stock Exchange chose the awardees in six categories, as well as the participants to receivespecial mentions.

Winners:

  • MAIN PRIZE – for the 2015 Integrated Report for Grupa Kapitałowa Lubelski Węgiel Bogdanka S.A.

http://raportyspoleczne.pl/wp-content/uploads/raports/fbbe31964a47137210a88c0e3029b37a.pdf

  • MINISTER OF DEVELOPMENT PRIZE for the 2015 Integrated Report for Grupa Kapitałowa Lubelski Węgiel Bogdanka S.A.