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The Sustainability Code

More than just a reporting standard.

The German Sustainability Code supports organisations in establishing a sustainable development strategy and represents a way in to sustainability reporting. Regular reporting affords greater visibility as to how a company develops over time. To comply with the Sustainability Code, user companies must compile and publish a declaration of conformity on the 20 Code criteria as well as supplementary non-financial performance indicators in the database.

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All companies that use the standards set out in the Code to report on their sustainability performance must publish their Sustainability Code declaration on our database. Discover who uses the Code to bring transparency to their sustainability performance.

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Do you want to make your sustainability performance transparent and submit a Sustainability Code declaration for your company? Find out how to create your Code declaration in just 5 steps.

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All Code declarations are created in our database.

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Benefits of the Code

  1. It supports organisations in establishing a sustainable development strategy and represents a way in to sustainability reporting. Regular reporting affords greater visibility as to how a company develops over time.
  2. It provides practical guidance on how to comply with the CSR reporting obligation and implement the German National Action Plan for Business and Human Rights. It also offers the option of reporting in line with the EU taxonomy.
  3. The Sustainability Code Office officially checks the declarations of conformity for completeness and provides user companies with professional feedback.
  4. The Code database is publicly accessible, which creates visibility. The published reports can then be compared with one another.
  5. Use of the Code is free of charge. The Code is a project of the German Council for Sustainable Development (RNE) funded by the German Federal Chancellery. The Sustainability Code Office, the Code’s training partners and its community platform on LinkedIn are all available to help with reporting.

The body behind the Code: The German Council for Sustainable Development (RNE)

The German Sustainability Code is a project of the German Council for Sustainable Development, an advisory body with a mandate from the German federal government. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz appointed 15 public figures to the RNE for a three-year period with effect from 16 February 2023.

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Olaf Scholz | Federal Chancellor
To mark the 1,000th user company on 12 April 2023
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I am delighted we now have 1,000 companies signed up to the German Sustainability Code. This plays a key role in building a sustainable economy here in Germany and around the globe. We need all hands on deck for the sustainable transition to succeed – including and especially the private sector. It is a huge success that firms large and small alike are voluntarily and transparently reporting on their activities based on the criteria set out in the German Sustainability Code. These companies are ‘pioneers of change’; they show how it can be done.

Who reports in line with the Code?

Over 1,000 companies are now making their sustainability performance transparent

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Database

3451 DNK-Declarations 1335 Companies

DNK-Database