Environmental, social and governance (ESG) has evolved at a rapid pace in recent years. We’ve seen a meteoric rise in stakeholder engagement and interest well beyond the investment community where the concept initially started to gain mainstream attention. This really accelerated in 2020 around the Covid pandemic when the importance of pressing global issues like the combined climate and biodiversity crises were re-evaluated. This was followed by well documented labour and sourcing issues as global economies opened back up after lockdowns. We are now entering a phase where there is a clear shift in progress, away from voluntary standards and best practice ESG frameworks, towards mandatory reporting and stricter disclosure requirements. These can be linked to specific issues such as physical and transition climate risks, but also to the more general ESG issues, for example supply chain and the associated issues of modern slavery and forced labour.
As a consequence, there is now more ESG data than ever before, and an ever-growing demand for good quality, accurate information, not just on or for an individual entity, but data and insights on its wider value chain.
