Events

On 26 May 2010, the EU-Japan Centre for Industrial Cooperation and the World Intellectual Capital Initiative (WICI), with the support of the Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry and the European Commission (DG Enterprise & Industry), as well as of JETRO Brussels, the Business Council in Europe (JBCE) and JMC Brussels, organised a full-day seminar on "Business Reporting for Sustainability", with the participation of Ambassador Naoto NIKAI (Japanese Mission to the EU) and Viscount Etienne DAVIGNON (President, CSR Europe), and speakers from HORIBA, Ltd., Novo Nordisk A/S, Accounting for Sustainability and the European Federation of Financial Analysts Societies (EFFAS), the European Parliament, e-Parcel Corp., Sakigake Semiconductor CO.,LTD., Wissenskapital GmbH and Doshisha University.

In the context of the global financial crisis people have realised the importance of sustainable capabilities of companies, which cannot easily be recognised through financial reporting, hence the need to establish a new mechanism of business reporting which enables the evaluation of the exact value of a company, covering not only financial but also non-financial information, including ESG/CSR, in which society has a great interest. Based on experiences of European and Japanese companies, regardless of their size, to communicate with stakeholders, the seminar debated the need for a framework for business reporting for sustainability, focusing on non-financial information relating to a company’s business strategy, its own value creation mechanism and its economic performance, rather than asking companies for as much information as possible from a purely social point of view.

There was a main stream of thinking that disclosure and Business Reporting for Sustainability should become general practices to help all stakeholders take informed and responsible decisions: all companies should be required to report publicly on their ESG performance, or if they don't, explain why.

There was also a generally-shared view that non-financial reporting and financial reporting need to converge into an integrated reporting system using quantitative indicators and allowing an embedded decision-making process. In particular, that process would benefit to SMEs who do not have access to stocks and therefore need other sources of financing (bank loans or public subventions).

There was less consensus about the regulatory aspect of the reporting practice, its geographic standards (national? European? International?) and whom should take the lead (governmental initiative or corporate ownership?) Since both Europe and Japan have many common elements, including the interests of governments on this issue, ESG/CSR awareness, and a shared sense of balance between social and economic values, it is expected that both regions can find more opportunities to cooperate with each other to establish a global mechanism that would promote the benefits of integrated reporting, implement all related issues and avoid overlapping initiatives.

The audience gathered about 45 participants from EU and Japanese Authorities as well as from major EU and Japanese companies.

Pictures of the event. Click on a thumbnail to zoom in.

Speakers Photo © EU-Japan Centre, 2010

Audience Photo © EU-Japan Centre, 2010