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Overview

In September 2014, the European Parliament and the Council of the EU adopted the NFRD, which amended the Accounting Directive (Council Directive 2013/34/EU) and required the disclosure of nonfinancial and diversity information.

Scope

• Large¹ companies (and parent companies of groups)

  • which are public interest entities (PIEs)²

  • with an average number of more than 500 employees (on a consolidated basis in the case of groups).

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^{1 The Accounting Directive determines a company to be large if it exceeds at least two of the following criteria on its balance sheet date: (i) a balance sheet total of EUR 25 million, (ii) net turnover of EUR 50 million, and (iii) an average of 250 employees during the financial year. Note that these thresholds apply from financial years 2024 onwards and thresholds (i) and (ii) were previously lower (namely, balance sheet total of EUR 20 million, net turnover of EUR 40 million).}

^{2 The Accounting Directive defines the following companies as PIEs: (i) EU companies admitted to trading on an EU regulated market, (ii) credit institutions, (iii) insurance undertakings, and (iv) other companies designated by member states as PIEs}

Objective

According to the NFRD, its objective was:

• To increase the relevance, consistency and comparability of information disclosed by certain large undertakings and groups across the Union’ on nonfinancial and diversity topics

• To stimulate change toward a sustainable global economy

Disclosure requirements

The NFRD extended the scope of management reports³ and required the inclusion of a nonfinancial statement encompassing the development, performance, position and impact of activities related to at least the following areas:

• the environment,

• social and employee matters,

• respect for human rights, and

• anti-corruption and bribery matters.

The NFRD required companies (and groups) to report about their

• business model,

• policies including due diligence processes,

• outcome of these policies, and 

• risks and key performance indicators regarding social, environmental, employee-related, human rights, anti-corruption, and bribery matters.

Moreover, for EU companies traded on an EU regulated market, the NFRD extended the scope of the corporate governance statement, as defined in the Accounting Directive (Article 20), to also contain diversity information. 

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^{3 Country legislators could allow companies and parent companies in scope of the NFRD to publish the nonfinancial information in a separate report instead.}

Guidelines

Nonbinding reporting guidelines were published by the European Commission in 2017 and 2019:

• Commission Guidelines 2017/C 215/01

• Commission Guidelines 2019/C 209/01

The guidelines detailed the concept of double materiality, thereby emphasizing that companies need to consider not only financial materiality but also its impact on people and the environment when defining reporting content.

Links and sources

• EUR-Lex, NFRD

• Hummel, K., Jobst, D., 2024. An Overview of Corporate Sustainability Reporting Legislation in the European Union. Accounting in Europe. DOI: 10.1080/17449480.2024.2312145

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