Assessments of a company’s own efforts towards sustainability and those of its suppliers are becoming more and more important, especially in the wake of the vote that took place on 18th June 2023. CRIF has therefore decided to assign an ESG score to every incorporated company in Switzerland.
Analysis of the incorporated companies evaluated in this way revealed that a third were awarded an ESG score of A or B. The businesses included in these two categories demonstrated either a very good or a good level of sustainability. The majority of those businesses that were assessed (i.e. 46.7 %) attained an ESG score of C, indicating a satisfactory level of sustainability.
Central Switzerland leads the field
A closer look at the individual cantons shows that the Canton of Zug is home to the highest percentage of companies assigned an A or B score (at 50.8%) followed by the Cantons of Nidwalden (39.1%) and Obwalden (37.5%). At the other end of the rankings, only 22.1% of all businesses in the Canton of Valais achieve a good or very good level of sustainability. However, the differences between the cantons mainly stem from their variety of industrial sectors.
The services sector with the best ESG scores
A glance at the breakdown by sector shows that most businesses attaining good or very good grades are to be found in the services sector. In percentage terms, the information and communications sectors (79.1%), the financial sector (76.5%) and the professional services sector (54%) are top of this category. The highest grade of all was only achieved by 0.9% of all companies. Here too, information and communications took first place, with 3.7% of such businesses achieving an ESG score of A.
About 20% of all the companies we evaluated showed a limited or poor level of sustainability, scoring a D or E grade. In the mining industry, this grade was awarded to 99.7% of companies, followed by the energy supply industry (at 99.1%) and the agricultural sector (98.7%).
ESG scores act as a critical indicator of a company’s commitment to sustainability, responsible business practices and corporate governance. This provides businesses in Switzerland with a valuable tool so that they can make data-based decisions and improve their ESG practices.
In addition, every company has an opportunity to improve the accuracy of its own ESG score by registering on CRIF’s global “Synesgy” platform for ESG certification and ESG supply chain management.
ESG score
CRIF’s ESG score assigns grades to Swiss companies that are active and entered into the Commercial Register, in line with the guidelines set out by the United Nations as the governing principles for responsible investments. ESG covers the environmental, social and corporate governance areas. An ESG evaluation is sub-divided into grades as follows: A (very good level of sustainability), B (good sustainability level), C (satisfactory sustainability level), D (limited sustainability level) and E (poor sustainability level).
