How would EU CSDD Directive affect developing countries and their companies?

On 27 March 2023, the Ministry for Foreign Affairs will publish two reports on how the forthcoming EU Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence (CSDD) Directive would affect developing countries and their companies and trade.

If adopted, the CSDD Directive would obligate large EU companies as well as smaller companies operating in defined high impact sectors to identify, mitigate and bring to an end adverse human rights and environmental impacts that are connected with their own and their business partners’ operations.

Consortiums led by Hanken School of Economics and University of Vaasa carried out case studies in Ethiopia, Tanzania and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Through the case studies, researchers have examined how the new legislation would affect the economies of especially the least developed countries, what kinds of bottlenecks it would create for joining EU value chains and how Finland could support the least developed countries in achieving the new objectives.

The Ministry for Foreign Affairs hopes that the two reports will bring the perspective of developing countries into the EU CSDD legislation. This perspective is essential for achieving the CSDD objectives, which are respect for human rights and environmental protection.

Invitation to the publication event

Welcome to join the publication of the two reports on Monday 27 March 2023. Read more about the event and its programme in this invitation (pdf, 170kb).

Please register by 22 March 2023 by using this link(Link to another website.). The event will be held in English.