Cleerit’s Post

Today 29/1, the European Commission presented the Competitiveness Compass, providing a strategic framework to steer the Commission's work. Key takeaways on the subject of sustainability reporting 🌿: ⭕ Simplify but stay the course Europe has set out an ambitious framework to become a decarbonised economy by 2050. It will stay the course, including through the intermediate 2040 target of 90%. Regulatory burden has become a brake on Europe’s competitiveness. The Commission will therefore aim to achieve the agreed policy objectives in the simplest, most targeted, most effective and least burdensome way. ⭕ Reduce the cost of administrative burdens The set burden reduction targets refer to the costs of all administrative burdens, and not only reporting requirements. The targets are to reduce recurrent costs by at least 25% for all companies, and at least 35% for SMEs through dedicated measures for SMEs. This will start next month with the first of a series of Simplification Omnibus packages. The first Omnibus will, among others, cover a far-reaching simplification in the fields of sustainable finance reporting, sustainability due diligence and taxonomy. The sustainable finance framework is aimed at mobilizing investment in the clean transition. The Commission will ensure better alignment of the requirements with the needs of investors, but also ✔️ proportionate timelines, ✔️ financial metrics that do not discourage investments in smaller companies in transition, and ✔️ obligations proportionate to the scale of activities of different companies. ⭕ Address trickle-down effects The trickle-down effect will be addressed to prevent smaller companies along the supply chains from being subjected in practice to excessive reporting requests that were never intended by the legislators. ⭕ Define a new category of company size: small mid-caps To ensure proportionate regulation adapted to companies’ size, a new definition of small mid-caps will soon be proposed. By creating such a new category of company, bigger than SMEs but smaller than large companies, thousands of companies in the EU will benefit from tailored regulatory simplification in the same spirit as SMEs. The Commission is also preparing a simplification of the Carbon Border Adjustment mechanism for smaller market players. ⭕ Digitize reporting Digitalisation will go hand in hand with simplification to reduce the reporting burden. Wherever possible, reporting must move to digital formats based on standardised data. Companies and public authorities must be better accompanied when it comes to implementing EU legislation through stepped up support, capacity building and technical assistance.   Source: https://lnkd.in/d_gN2ySa   #getCSRDready, #Omnibus