REPORTING CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY ACCORDING TO GRI STANDARDS

Abstract

Corporate social responsibility is no longer considered an optional activity by companies. The changes that take place worldwide have determined an increasing number of companies to elaborate instruments of implementing CSR principles into their business strategy. A CSR policy adapted to the specifics of the company’s field of activity and to the community in which it is present will bring advantages for both parties. The way through which a company makes their CSR activity results public is by writing a sustainability report which corresponds to international practices in the field. In recent years, an increasing number of companies publish their yearly CSR reports. This reporting originated in the USA, but in the last decade, the number of reports from Europe is increasing. In order to answer to the needs of reporting of the companies, a series of nongovernmental organisms have involved in trying to find the most accessible way that would correspond to the needs of the companies and of the stakeholders. Global Reporting Initiative is a platform that came to the aid of the companies by creating reporting standards which to guide companies through the process of creating the sustainability report. In this paper, we have analysed the evolution in the number of CSR reports worldwide, having then analysed their distribution on continents. We have given attention to the situation in Romania, which in the past ten years, due to multinational companies coming in the market. The presence of multinational companies has helped develop this concept. In the past five years, Romanian companies have submitted CSR reports according to GRI standards. Although the percent of companies of Romanian companies that submit reports according to the GRI standards is small (0.0017%), we believe that it will grow in following years, due to companies realizing the role they have in the society and because the European Commission’s 2014/95/EU Directive will enter into force, according to which all companies with more than 500 employees will be forced to report a series of nonfinancial indicators.

Keywords

• corporate social responsibility, reporting, GRI Standard.