Report | October 30, 2023

Ensuring companies address adverse environmental impacts in their value chains: The case of illegal fishing

Summary

The EU’s Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD) will introduce obligations on companies to conduct environmental and human rights due diligence in relation to their operations, subsidiaries, and value chains. This briefing calls for the definition of adverse environmental impacts within CSDDD to sufficiently cover a broad range of impacts, in line with other relevant EU legislation and international standards, including the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive and 2023 OECD Guidelines. It uses the case of illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing to demonstrate that a definition of adverse environmental impacts that is limited in scope or lacking precision can lead to a situation where impacts, which cause significant pressure on nature and biodiversity, are absent from a company’s due diligence processes.