Companies face pressure to adhere to standardized frameworks for environmental, social, and governance (ESG) reporting, similar to those for financial reporting to stakeholders.
But the subjective nature of ESG reporting makes it “impractical” and “extremely costly” for companies to do in a standardized way when compared to the more objective financial reporting, say experts at the Fraser Institute.
The heads of Canada’s eight leading pension plan investment managers, representing some $1.6 trillion in assets, called for companies to adhere to the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures framework in 2020.
Such frameworks, one among more than 600 available to companies, don’t represent the varied opinions and interests of stakeholders, said Elmira Aliakbari, director of the Fraser Institute’s Centre for Natural Resource Studies, and Steven Globerman, a senior fellow at the Fraser Institute, in an essay published April 21….