Sustainability reporting can smooth out LDC graduation: Experts

Two issues – environmental compliance and labour rights – will be prominent factors in Bangladesh’s overseas market access during the upcoming LDC transition.

An institutional framework is needed to promote and guide relevant practices for the sake of a stronger and sustainable private sector growth.

Sustainability reporting – which is the disclosure and communication of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) goals, as well as a company’s progress towards them – will be critical to this end, speakers said at a dialogue on Saturday.

The event titled “Sustainability Reporting by the Private Sector in Bangladesh: Expectations and Experience” was hosted at Dhaka’s BRAC Centre Inn by the Citizen’s Platform for SDGs, Bangladesh, in partnership with United Nations Development Program (UNDP) Bangladesh and United Nations Environment  Program Poverty-Environment Action.

Centre for Policy Dialogue’s (CPD) Senior Research Fellow Towfiqul Islam Khan delivered the keynote presentation. Sustainability reporting helps the private sector ensure short-term profits do not turn into long-term liabilities, he pointed out.

Khan added that 49 DSE listed companies (15 per cent) out of 320 firms submitted sustainability reports in 2019, with only 11 following the standard reporting framework (3 per cent).

The dialogue was moderated by Debapriya Bhattacharya, convenor of the Citizen’s Platform for SDGs, Bangladesh and distinguished fellow at the CPD.

He mentioned that sustainability reporting is significant in the process of LDC graduation and SDG. “We should include a strategy paper in the LDC. Otherwise, we cannot achieve northern values,” Debapriya said.

Amitabh Chakraborty, additional director at the Sustainable Finance Department at Bangladesh Bank said, “Though the Bangladesh Bank has promoted sustainability reporting, no formal regulation is currently in place.

“The central bank is expecting to publish a structured report on sustainability within 2030.”

Prasenjit Chakma, assistant resident representative at the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Bangladesh, said, “We must figure out the regulatory status of the reporting process, whether it should be voluntary or mandatory, and measure the awareness level among the companies as well as consumers.

“The role of UNDP here can be setting a regulatory standard and proposing a draft policy setting. Compliance measurement is needed for market access in the future.”

Lawmaker Saber Hossain Chowdhury, chairman of the Standing Committee on the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, was present as the chief guest at the dialogue.

He said, “We should talk about the importance of sustainability reporting and how it can benefit the private sector. To this end, there are three motivations for the private sector – cost reduction, profitability, and increased income.

“The process should start from the micro-level industry, and that is the key.”

Several eminent business leaders contributed to the dialogue, including  Asif Ibrahim, chairman of the Chittagong Stock Exchange; Kamran T Rahman, senior vice president of the Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce and Industry (MCCI); Fazlul Haque, former president of Bangladesh Knitwear Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BKMEA), Shams Mahmud former president of the Dhaka Chamber of Commerce & Industry (DCCI); Zaved Akhtar, CEO of Unilever Bangladesh Ltd; M Abu Eusuf, executive director of RAPID and a professor of the Department of Development Studies at Dhaka University; and Mr Raquibul Amin, country representative at the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).