【Event】The 8th International Conference on CSR Reporting in China Boosts New Development

Themed with “Responsible Communication Creates Value”, the 8th International Conference on CSR Reporting in China was held in Beijing on December 3, 2015.
Strengthening CSR information disclosure becomes an international trend
As CSR develops globally, CSR information disclosure has drawn wide attention.
In Europe, non-financial information disclosure has become a directive. On December 5, 2014, amending Directive 2013/34/EU as regards disclosure of non-financial and diversity information by certain large undertakings and groups officially came into effect. By the end of 2016, it will have been the national legislation for 28 European countries. According to the directive, in 2018, about 6,000 large public entities will have to disclose their non-financial information of 2017.
At the conference, Ola Löhman, ESG Director of CSR Sweden, introduced the progress that has been made since 2014, as well as the important role of reporting in promoting management and communication.
Goldenbee Index on CSR Reporting in China 2015 released
On the conference, Goldenbee Index on CSR Reporting in China 2015 was unvealed and it reveals the nine main findings as follows;
1. The overall quality of CSR reports has been steadily improved and the number of high-quality reports has been increasing year-on-year.
2. The CSR reports of central SOEs position a leading role on quality and continue to improve.
3. The employees, community and government are the three focused stakeholders in CSR reports.
4. The index on Chinese Environmental Information Disclosure (CEID) surges by 10.8% year on year.
5. The CSR management information disclosure gets more attention.
6. Industry organizations and government-related departments are the driving forces for the releases of CSR reports.
7. The CSR reports of foreign-invested enterprises surge by 104.2% year on year, with over 50% from Japanese and American enterprises and increasing quality of the reports.
8. The proportion of English CSR reports is less than 8%. There is a big fluctuation on the CSR reports that make reference to the international standard. The international level of CSR report needs to be increased.
9. Non-business organizations are highly motivated on releasing CSR reports, but it is still in the initial stage.
Based on the findings, GoldenBee Index proposes the suggestions as follows:
I.  To dock with the national standard series of social responsibility and improve the quality of CSR reports.
II. To disclose much more information on responsibility management ideas and measures and give full play to the management value of CSR.
III. To keep in line with the international advanced enterprises and increase the disclosure of issues on consumers, supply chain, partners and others.
IV. To support stakeholders to engage in preparing reports compilation and enhance the materiality of reports.
V. To keep up with the development trend of the Times and promote the internationalization level of the reports.
VI. To release special report on key projects or major responsibility fulfillments, and enhance the influence and reputation of the enterprise.
VII. To continuously innovate on the dissemination channels and ways of CSR reports by embracing new mobile Internet era.
VIII. To call for the Fortune China 500 release social responsibility report, and play the leading demonstration value of leader enterprises.
The index series of the report consist of three sections, namely “comprehensive index”, “stakeholder index” and “category index”. In addition, it also includes 7 sub-series with 46 items in total. Through six-dimension evaluation like materiality and integrity of CSR reports released by mainland China, the report has summarized the overall status quo of CSR reports in China. Moreover, the report has conducted a special research for central SOEs, foreign-invested enterprises in China, non-enterprise organizations, as well as mining, automobile, electricity, architecture, information communication technology, banking and real estate industries
CSR Reporting plays a more vital role in the new trend
The international conference also attached great attention to the hot topics such as CSR management, “the Belt and Road initiative”, “Internet Plus” era and SOE responsible information disclosure, and conducted in-depth discussions on parallel panels. How to give full play to the value of reporting? Experts at the conference shed light on the latest trends, for example, standard and reporting upgrading.
The International Conference on CSR Reporting in China has been successfully held seven times by now. The conference released “2015 GoldenBee CSR Report Honor Roll” and 62 excellent social responsibility reports outstood. The enterprises were awarded in seven categories such as “Leading Enterprises”, “Growing Enterprises”, “Special Award for Foreign Invested and HK,Macao and Taiwan Invested Enterprises”, and “Evergreen Enterprises” and so on. Only the “top 500 Chinese enterprises” are eligible to the Honor Roll. It also requires the disclosure of enterprises’ CSR philosophies, practices, performance, and typical cases of the past year in the report and all those information should fully reflect the industry characteristics and corporate features.
Experts pointed out that, in the first 10 months of 2015, China released 2,265 CSR reports. The overall quality of CSR reports has been increasing steadily and the number of high-quality reports has been growing year by year. This is in line with the international development that CSR information disclosure is getting strengthened.
The conference was organized by China WTO Tribune and China Business Council for Sustainable Development, and co-organized by Embassy of Sweden in China and GIZ. Over 300 participants from domestic and international government agencies, enterprises, industry associations and research institutes shared and exchanged the latest trends, rules and regulations on CSR reporting. Representatives from SASAC and Ministry of Industry and Information Technology attended the conference and delivered speeches.