Simpler EU rules don't mean easier ESG work

In the survey cited by a new ESG Today guest essay, only 5% of organisations say they are waiting for the EU to clarify its sustainability rules before acting, down from 12% a year earlier. The article, published Sept. 2, reads that drop as evidence that the 2026 reset is settling in: changes to the ESRS and the phased implementation of the CSDDD have given businesses greater clarity while the EU's 2026 measures narrowed reporting requirements and trimmed some due-diligence burdens. After years spent preparing for disclosure rules, the authors argue, the conversation has moved to what sustainability can deliver for resilience, risk management and growth.

That sharper view is already shifting corporate priorities, the authors say. In their survey, 66% of organisations increased supply-chain transparency and risk-management efforts, up from 53% last year, while investment in sustainability and risk-management software rose from 19% to 36%. Integrating sustainability into strategy, operations and product portfolios now ranks among leading executive priorities ahead of producing disclosures and external communications.

The authors also use the reset to surface a quality problem, citing a meta-study of more than 15,000 sustainability disclosure documents that found average reports became less specific, less quantitative and more promotional as reporting spread. In their telling, more reporting did not automatically mean better reporting, and simpler reporting will not automatically make the underlying task easier.

That is the right way to read the reset: the burden is being moved, not lifted. The EU's 2026 changes reduced some reporting and due-diligence requirements, but the operational exposure behind climate, circularity and social-impact programs survives the paperwork cut. The sharp fall in the share of organisations waiting for clarity suggests most companies have already reached that conclusion. Companies that treat the narrowed disclosure perimeter as permission to shrink internal programs will likely find themselves rebuilding capability when the next phase of the rulebook arrives, and investors will care less about how many reports land than how specific they are.

The essay does not ask for further rule changes; its prescription is managerial: use the planning certainty the 2026 reset provides to deepen work already underway. For policy watchers, the more telling shift is where the burden sits now that the compliance question is largely settled, as the 5% waiting figure suggests. The harder question is whether the disclosures Europe does collect will be worth reading.