Researchers from LMU Munich and the University of Cologne have used AI to analyse 2.9m sustainability indicators included in 6,000 European large, listed companies’ reports between 2014 and 2023.
On average, they found, companies disclosed 52.4% more indicators in 2023 than they did in 2014.
The dataset and the code will be made publicly available via the Sustainability Reporting Navigator open science initiative.
Kerstin Forster, lead author of the study, stated: “Before now, sustainability data were often buried in long reports or only available from commercial providers at a price. Our open-source approach now empowers supervisory authorities, investors, and NGOs to systematically compare companies and hold them to account.”