Does the sustainability report have to be audited by an external auditor?

The sustainability report must be assessed by an external auditor. This may be the external auditor that also audits the financial statements but may also be another external accountant. In the Netherlands, other ‘assurance providers’ other than an external accountant may not assess the sustainability report.

The minimum requirement for external assessment of the sustainability report ('limited assurance') under the CSRD is less thorough than an external audit of the financial statements ('reasonable assurance'). However, the required assessment of the sustainability report does go considerably beyond the effort currently required and conducted by an external auditor to assess the management report. An example of what the external assurance provider is looking for is in the selection of stakeholders as part of the materiality analysis. A way in which an external assurance provider executes assurance procedures would be to look into the value chain of the undertaking and see if important stakeholders in this process are included in the materiality analysis. Through this, they see if an undertaking’s stakeholders who may be directly or indirectly impacted by the activities of the undertaking play a role in the analysis.

For the external assessment of the sustainability report, the external auditor provider shall perform an audit of all required information presented in the sustainability report and whether it corresponds to the undertaking’s actual sustainability performance and the completeness thereof. The external auditor will only provide a limited content-related assessment on what is reported.

Questions CSRD & ESRS

Do you have questions about the CSRD, ESRS or are you missing a question in this list? Send us an e-mail and we will contact you as soon as possible. For technical questions, EFRAG has set up an ESRS Q&A platform (latest release of technical explanations: December 2024). Here you can submit a question, and also find answers to previously asked questions.

Questions regarding individual facts or circumstances will not be answered through these channels. For such questions, we recommend that you contact an advisor such as your company accountant.

Disclaimer

The SER and the DASB have put this questions and answers document together based on publicly available information at the time of publication. Although these questions have been answered with the utmost care, users of this document cannot be given any guarantees relating to the accuracy, topicality and completeness of the information displayed. The SER, the DASB and other parties related to this document cannot be held liable for the consequences of the use of the information from this document. This document does not represent the view of (EFRAG) or the European Commission, nor the SER or DASB.

It is not permitted to copy or distribute the included information or individual elements (including images) without explicit permission, if this may cause confusion about the origin of the material.

Sustainability