Online sustainability reporting - Europe largest companies

19 apr 2006

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In December 2005 Jungle Rating analysed the quality of online sustainability reporting among the 50 largest European companies. StoraEnso, a Finish paper producing company, has the most extensive and transparent online sustainability section on their corporate website. Although some companies have strong sustainability sections, there are ample possibilities to improve.

Europe’s largest companies

We initially included all 100 companies quoted in the FTSEurofirst 100 index in our research. In order to be able to select 50 companies out of all 100 companies, we conducted a preliminary research assessing each corporate website on ten criteria. Thereafter, in December 2005, we measured the quality of online sustainability reporting of the 50 selected companies on 149 variables spread over 11 dimensions.

We measured:

Website characteristics and website content

Website characteristics, comprising accessibility (navigation, text, FAQ’s, etc.), interactivity (contact information and possibilities), multimediality (use of images, sound and video) and personalisation (possibilities for visitors to personalise content, for example interactive charts)
Information quality, in terms of: completeness and transparency. We assessed the quality of online sustainability information, based on the guidelines by the Global Reporting Initiative. Next to that we analysed general company information and topical information regarding sustainability.

StoraEnso, most comprehensive online sustainability section

We found that StoraEnso, followed shortly by Shell, BT Group and BP, provides the most comprehensive online sustainability reporting section. The subsequent table provides an overview of the top 20 companies, industries (based upon FTSE global classification), country of origin and their scores. The average score is 30% and the lowest score is 16%.

Top 20

2005	Company	Sector	Country	Score
1	StoraEnso	Basic industries	Finland	47%
2	Shell	Resources	United Kingdom - the Netherlands	44%
3	BT Group	Services	United Kingdom	43%
4	BP	Resources	United Kingdom	43%
5	Vodafone Group	Services	United Kingdom	41%
6	Rio Tinto	Resources	United Kingdom	40%
7	National Grid Transco	Utilities	United Kingdom	39%
8	Lafarge	Basic industries	France	38%
9	HSBC	Financials	United Kingdom	37%
10	DaimlerChrysler	Consumer goods	Germany	37%
11	BHPBilliton	Resources	United Kingdom	37%
12	BAT	Consumer goods	United Kingdom	35%
13	Tesco	Services	United Kingdom	35%
14	BASF	Basic industries	Germany	34%
15	GlaxoSmithKline	Consumer goods	United Kingdom	33%
16	Siemens	General industries	Germany	33%
17	RWE	Utilities	Germany	33%
18	Repsol	Resources	Spain	33%
19	BAA	Services	United Kingdom	32%
20	Cadbury Schweppes	Consumer goods	United Kingdom	32%

Source: Jungle Rating, December 2005

Large differences among European companies

We found that, whilst some companies yet provide comprehensive online sustainability reporting sections, others only publish an online version of their sustainability report. Most companies (74%) present an accessible online sustainability section in the main navigation of their website. On 40% of the corporate websites we found specific contact information for sustainability purposes.

We noticed that only a few companies yet enrich their online sustainability information with images (10%) or video (8,7%).

Of the three sustainability pillars (People, Planet, Profit), companies provide most information on the environmental dimension. They seem to have difficulties incorporating economic information into their online sustainability section.

Source: Jungle Rating, December 2005

Resource and Service companies obtain highest scores

Next to a general analysis, Jungle Rating compared the scores per industry, including those industries with a share of 10% or more in the dataset (i.e. Consumer goods, financials, resources and services). Companies in the resource industry score highest, on average, while financials stay behind.

We conducted the same analysis on a country level, including those countries with a representation of 10% or more (France, Germany, the Netherlands and the UK). Companies from the UK ended up first, followed shortly by companies from the Netherlands and Germany.

Take advantage of the internet

In the field of sustainability reporting, companies do not yet make use of the full potential the internet has to offer. In our next newsletter (week 18) we will examine online sustainability reporting more thoroughly by providing challenges and tips which will increase the transparency and extensiveness of online sustainability reporting.

Some interesting facts:

These facts are based upon the final research on the quality of online sustainability reporting of the 50 selected companies.

74% of the companies have placed ‘sustainability’ as a separate item in their main navigation.
60% of all companies do not inform their visitors on specific contact persons for sustainability.
Nearly each company (94%) provides either a sustainability report or both a social and an environmental report.
We found that only 20% of all companies provide an external assurance statement of their sustainability information within their online sustainability section.
62% of the companies have press releases about sustainability on their website (either social, environmental or economic).
24% explain to some extent the role and nature of the various materials they use in their production processes. 18% of all companies do provide quantitative information on the materials used as well.
66% of all companies inform on their donations to society, either direct or indirect
A code of conduct is available on 64% of all websites.
Of all companies, only 28% communicate on last years sustainability performance compared to the performance of previous years.