How are Stakeholder Relations Communicated in Sustainability Reports? A Longitudinal and Cross-country Focus

Since stakeholders today are more aware and informed of various sustainability aspects, they are also becoming more involved and participate in shaping sustainability discourses (see e.g. Golob et al. 2017). It is vital to understand if companies utilise this accentuated commitment towards sustainability aspects by interacting with their stake - holders and involving them in different engagement activities aimed at developing and improving their sustainability practices. Thus, grounded on legitimacy and stake holder theory, the objective is to analyse how stakeholder relations are communicated in sustainability reports. The focus is on the extent, content and structure of informa tion related to three themes; stakeholder-identification analysis, stakeholder engagement & dialogue and materiality process. The study applies a content-analysis methodology in which sustainability reports from two EU-reporting settings, Germany and Sweden, are at focus. The reports come from the largest listed companies included in the indexes DAX30 and OMXS30. The analysis confirms an increased and elaborated focus on sustainability relations in both the German and Swedish sustainability reports. While stakeholder-identification analysis receives remarkable little attention in the reports, much focus is on stakeholder engagement & dialogue and the materiality process. However, most companies fail to explain how the outcome of both their stakeholder-engagement activities and materiality process will affect or be integrated in business operations. This indicates that the companies might not or at least not fully utilize the involvement with their stake holders to develop and improve their sustainability practices

Comprehension, mapping and reporting of climate-related risks among listed firms in Sweden

We study the comprehension, mapping, and reporting of climate-related risks among firms listed on the NasdaqOMX stock exchange in Stockholm. Our study contains two parts: i) a study on the firms’ external communication through their annual reports, sustainability reports and webpages, and ii) a follow-up survey addressed to each firm’s management team. We find that firms are likely to engage in some form of mapping and reporting of climate-related risks. However, their comprehension of the nature of these risks, underlying problems, and what a climate transition implies varies across firms and industries. There are also substantial variations in the method employed to map and report climate- related risks. Our results further suggest that firms use the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures’ recommendations (TCFD) on how to map and report climate risks as a learning tool to improve their climate-risk management. However, as a voluntary initiative it is insufficient to generate substantial change. Consequently, policymakers should focus on improving firms’ comprehension of what constitutes a climate-risk, how to map such risks and how to report them. The mapping and reporting of climate-related risk may otherwise prove an inefficient tool to redirect and accelerate investments promoting a low-carbon and climate-resilient economy

Resourcification : A Non-Essentialist Theory of Resources for Sustainable Development

Overuse of resources is accelerating today’s negative trends in climate change, ecosystem destruction, and biodiversity loss. The ultimate result is contemporary human societies are reaching or exceeding the limits of planetary boundaries. It is therefore imperative to articulate a new theoretical understanding of resources and the ethical, political and environmental conditions of their use. In this article, we introduce a radical departure from existing paradigms, which treat resources as having fixed essential qualities usually ready-to-exploit by anyone who finds them, to a non-essentialist theory of how resources never exist in this fashion as such. Instead, they come into being as the result of social processes. We label this approach resourcification. This shift offers a new theoretical platform for developing a post-sustainability understanding of the relationships of humans to humans, to other living creatures, and to the physical environment, which is more suited to meet the challenges of working with the sustainable development goals in the Anthropocene

Lunds Kommun Klimatpolitiska råd: Rapport 2023

Förra året utsåg EU-kommissionen Lund till en av 100europeiska städer som ska bli klimatneutrala till 2030.Det är en utmärkelse som förpliktigar, särskilt i en tiddå klimatpolitiken på nationell nivå tappar styrfart(Klimatpolitiska rådet 2023). Lunds kommun har redangjort mycket som är bra, men både kan och behövergöra mer för att uppnå egna klimatmål och för att varaett föredöme för andra städer och kommuner som intekommit lika långt. Kommunen pekar på tre områdensom centrala i omställningsarbetet. Det handlar om 1)transporter, 2) cirkulär ekonomi, och 3) energi.Lunds kommuns klimatpolitiska råd (Rådet) bildadeshösten 2018 med uppdrag att utvärdera om kommunenssamlade politik är förenlig med de klimatmål somantagits av kommunfullmäktige. Utvärderingen presen-teras årligen i en rapport som granskar olika aspekterav kommunens klimatarbete. Rådet består av forskarefrån Lunds universitet och SLU Alnarp. Utav rådets sexmedlemmar är fem nya sedan den förra rapporten. Rådetuppskattar förtroendet att utvärdera kommunens klimat-arbete men är samtidigt ödmjuka inför komplexiteten iuppdraget. Ambitionen för Rådet är att vara en “kritiskvän” som är konstruktiv och lösningsorienterad

Lunds kommuns klimatpolitiska råd : Rapport 2021

Lunds kommuns klimatpolitiska råd (Rådet) bildades hösten 2018 med uppdrag att utvärdera hur Lunds kommuns samlade politik är förenlig med de klimatmål som antagits av kommunfullmäktige. Rådet, som består av forskare från Lunds universitet (LU) och SLU Alnarp, har sammantaget en bred tvär- och mångvetenskaplig kompetens och en gedigen erfarenhet av samverkan med olika samhällsaktörer.Samarbetet mellan Lunds kommun och akademin har sedan länge stimulerat utvecklingen i Lund och utgör en viktig källa till nytänkande och problemlösning.Rådet uppskattar förtroendet att utvärdera kommunens klimatarbete men uttrycker samtidigt en ödmjukhet inför komplexiteten i detta arbete. Rådets ambition är att sträva efter att vara kritiskt granskande men också konstruktiv och lösningsorienterad för att kunna bidra till utvecklingen av det lokala klimatarbetet.Rådet presenterar årligen en rapport i vilken Lunds kommuns klimatarbete granskas. Detta är Rådets tredje rapport i vilken Rådet valt att fokusera på Lunds kommuns förslag till nya klimatmål i miljömålsprogrammet LundaEko. Denna granskningkompletteras med en uppföljning av de klimatmål som antagits i den tidigare versionen av LundaEko (LundaEko II 2014-2020) inom områdena Minstamöjliga klimatpåverkan och Klimatanpassning. Rådet har i sin granskning utgått från tillgängliga planer, dokument, redovisningar och data. Detta material har kompletterats med samtal med ansvariga tjänstepersoner. Under arbetets gång har Rådet även fört dialog med Ungdomspolitiken i Lund, som på egen hand granskat LundaEko ur ett ungdomsperspektiv.Under 2020 har mandatet för några rådsledamöter löpt ut – Lena Hiselius (LU), Anna Peterson (SLU Alnarp), Markku Rummukainen (LU) och Catharina Sternudd (LU) – och de har avtackats för sina insatser under de inledande två åren. Samtidigt har nya ledamöter tillkommit – Cecilia Akselsson (LU), Susanne Arvidsson (LU), Anders Larsson (SLU Alnarp) och Lars J Nilsson (LU) – som tillsammans med övriga ledamöter har deltagit i den granskning som presenteras i denna rapport

Health claims in the labelling and marketing of food products:: the Swedish food sector's Code of Practice in a European perspective

Since 1990 certain health claims in the labelling and marketing of food products have been allowed in Sweden within the food sector's Code of Practice. The rules were developed in close dialogue with the authorities. The legal basis was a decision by the authorities not to apply the medicinal products’ legislation to “foods normally found on the dinner table” provided the rules defined in the Code were followed. The Code of Practice lists nine well-established diet–health relationships eligible for generic disease risk reduction claims in two steps and general rules regarding nutrient function claims. Since 2001, there has also been the possibility for using “product-specific physiological claims (PFP)”, subject to premarketing evaluation of the scientific dossier supporting the claim. The scientific documentation has been approved for 10 products with PFP, and another 15 products have been found to fulfil the Code's criteria for “low glycaemic index”. In the third edition of the Code, active since 2004, conditions in terms of nutritional composition were set, i.e. “nutrient profiles”, with a general reference to the Swedish National Food Administration's regulation on the use of a particular symbol, i.e. the keyhole symbol. Applying the Swedish Code of practice has provided experience useful in the implementation of the European Regulation on nutrition and health claims made on foods, effective from 2007