French companies are among good students in terms of corporate social responsibility (CSR) according to a study published on Tuesday, while these issues face the upside down worldwide. According to the sixth edition of this study, published by Ecovadis, an audit firm specialized in the subject, and the mediator of the companies, France is positioned in this area, behind Finland and Sweden. The actions of 89,000 companies (including 10,000 French women) have analyzed around 24 criteria, including international standards on the environment or human rights.
Evaluation: France saw its score in 2024 with 60.4 points of 100 (compared to 57.6 in 2022), against a European average of 57.2 points, 55.8 points for the OECD and 45.2 points for China. In France, 36% of the companies evaluated reached the “advanced” category (65 points and more), compared to 19% in 2020.
“Continuous progress”
The results were stopped at the end of 2024, before his arrival at the White House of Donald Trump, fierce opposite CSR problems and the questioning of some of these criteria at European level. Since November, a bill of the European Commission, known as “Omnibus”, aims to simplify three texts that form the European Green Pact and of which the European Directive “CSRD” is part. He is also worried about the simplification project, the directive “CS3D”, which requires companies to respect the environment and human rights throughout their production chain, even for their suppliers and subcontractors.
European employer organizations, including Medef in France, want to go even further and make omnibus “a starting point”, while NGOs are worried about garbage in environmental regulations. Pierre Blauzet sees it as “a double movement; a movement of continuous progress (…) and at the same time questioning a tool that may seem a bit complex for small businesses.”
Source: BFM TV
