Four top European companies collected major awards in the fourth annual European Environmental Reporting Awards in Brussels today. Companies from ten European countries – the UK, France, Germany, Denmark, Italy, Portugal, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Finland and Belgium – competed for the title of best European environmental reporters. The award is made each year by the leading accountancy bodies in Europe. In the UK, the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) is the sponsoring body. At the beginning of March, ACCA announced the results of the ninth annual UK environmental reporting awards.
The overall winner of the European awards is the Finnish oil and gas company Neste Fortum (Fortum Oil and Gas Oy). Roger Adams, ACCA Technical Director, says "Neste Fortum was selected because of the quality and depth of its reporting. The UK’s United Utilities – winner of the British event – was chosen as runner-up. "The European judges agreed with their UK counterparts. UU’s report has excellent climate change and sustainable economy sectors."
A special commendation for communication was made to DaimlerChrysler AG of Germany. The first timer reporter award was given to the Danish business Grundfos A/S. The awards were presented by the European Environment Commissioner, Margot Wallstrom, who said "Corporate environmental reports have improved the disclosure of environmental issues by firms and this European Environmental Reporting Awards scheme is making a major contribution in this area, as a result of efforts by professional accountancy bodies such as ACCA and the other sponsoring bodies. Of course, much remains to be done to further enhance the acceptance and usefulness of companies’ environmental reports, in particular in terms of greater harmonisation – and the Commission is working towards this end".
The ten sponsoring bodies are: ACCA, Foreningen af Statsautoriserede (Denmark), Institut des Reviseurs d’Entreprises/Instiuut der Bedrijfsrevisoren (Belgium), TreuhandKammer (Switzerland), Consiglio Nazionale dei Dottori Commercialisti (Italy), Orden dos Revisores Oficias de Contas (Portugal), Koninklijk Nederlands Instituut van Registeraccountants (Netherlands), Ordre des Experts-Comptables (France) and Wirtschaftspruferkammer (WPK) (Germany).