We Need to Work More than Ever towards a Sustainable Europe

A New Year message from Stefan Crets, Executive Director at CSR Europe

COVID-19 is still a reality that we must all confront, especially the most vulnerable people in our societies. The unbelievable stream of events linked to the American elections pointed out once more the need to place inclusiveness high on the political agenda, right next to the protection of the environment, climate, and digitalisation.

At the same time, throughout 2020, we have also witnessed positive changes, allowing us to look forward with hope, confidence, and some level of trust to the new year ahead.

Decarbonisation became increasingly relevant, and more and more companies started not only to re-define their targets whilst also engaging with their suppliers to move in that direction. For example, Drive Sustainability, the global automotive supply chain initiative, launched its long-term strategy, formalising its ambitions to work together with suppliers on 4 sustainability challenges, including carbon neutrality.

In 2020, the Financial Times through its series ‘Moral Money’, registered the need to rethink the way we make capitalism work; contributing to mainstream the importance of Environmental, Social, Governance (ESG) metrics in financing the zero-carbon transition.

From COVID-19 to a just, green, and digital transition, all these challenges are different pieces of the same puzzle; the one that we – as a network – embraced in the CSR Europe’s 2030 Strategy which we are trying to solve through the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

While the SDGs provide a common language and direction for all stakeholders, in 2021 we should move beyond using the attractive SDGs logo to brand publications. Instead, we need to act upon them and make the effort, individually, as a company, and collectively by forming collaborative platforms and alliances with all relevant stakeholders.

It is through our hard work, as employees and citizens, that we can genuinely progress towards the SDGs. This is what true sustainable leadership is about: engagement with relevant sectors and/or value chain peers working together with other stakeholders. That is what companies need to strive towards in their mid to long-term plans.

Leadership and Engagement are at the core of our 2021 activity plan aiming to deliver successful and sustainable business transformation:

COVID-19 FORCED OUR NETWORK TO INNOVATE AND WE WILL CONTINUE ALONG THIS PATH

This year, we will develop for our members a series of exclusive “CSR Europe Ateliers”; a format for sharing and learning in respect to specific sustainability challenges for the purpose of developing and implementing company-specific improvement plans.

In 2020, we expanded our activities attracting a wider group of organisations: our offer is even more open and inclusive. Virtual events have allowed us not only to engage with a wider group of organisations, partners, and stakeholders but also to reach a wider audience thus enhancing our geographical coverage which reached a pinnacle during the European SDG Summit 2020, which attracted more than 10,000 attendees over 5 days.

This year, we will develop a new European SDG Summit along with partners and stakeholders who have already been invited to make proposals on the form of their contribution.

To unlock our potential and achieve impact, CSR Europe will continue to offer open webinars throughout 2021.

The European Pact for Sustainable Industry launched last year, will continue in 2021 with company engagement delivering on their sustainability agenda in a practical way, together with their industry federations and value chain partners.

Our ethos is to see all industry federations having a sustainability strategy and action plan in place by 2024. We need to work TOGETHER to achieve this in 2021….

…It is my wish that this breakthrough can be achieved.

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