Driving sustainable impact

Driving sustainable impact: embracing the CSRD for long-term value

As we navigate our sustainability journey, adapting to the evolving regulatory landscape is key. The CSRD, a cornerstone of the EU Green Deal, is more than just a compliance requirement: it’s a catalyst for transformation across industries. While the CSRD may evolve, for example in light of the Omnibus package proposed in February 2025, we see it as an opportunity to accelerate meaningful change, enhance resilience, and create lasting value for both businesses and society. As such, our preparations for the 2026 deadline for integrated reporting are already well underway.

Our roadmap to CSRD compliance: a strategic journey towards 2026

Our roadmap towards 2026 sets out a clear, structured approach to ensure compliance with the Directive while integrating sustainability into the heart of our business operations. Below are the initial steps we’ve taken in recent months to prepare for the CSRD:

Double Materiality Assessment

1. Identifying stakeholder groups
Identifying, analyzing, and prioritizing our stakeholders is critical to understand our sustainability impacts, risks, and opportunities. We identified the following key stakeholders and organized targeted interviews with their representatives to gather their insights: suppliers and business partners, shareholders and management team, employees, customers, industry associations and regulators. This enabled us to better understand the impact of our operations and delineate our focus areas.

2. Benchmarking
To position ourselves effectively within the industry, we conducted a comprehensive benchmarking exercise. Starting with the European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS) list of topics, we selected those most relevant to our industry. We benchmarked against consulting peers and industry leaders, enabling us to move beyond the initial ESRS framework and identify emerging sustainability priorities.

3. Identifying impacts, risks, and opportunities (IROs)
In collaboration with subject matter experts, and guided by stakeholder feedback and benchmarking insights, we identified KPMG in Belgium’s key IROs. These were categorized as actual or potential to provide a comprehensive view of our sustainability landscape.
For each IRO, we conducted an in-depth analysis, assessing factors such as reasoning, scope, remediability, likelihood, and potential impact. This structured approach enabled us to evaluate the significance of each IRO in both the short, medium, and long term. Based on these insights, we identified our material topics, ensuring our sustainability reporting focuses on the issues that are most critical to our business and stakeholders.

4. Material topics*
The Double Materiality Assessment (DMA) currently identified eight material topics that are critical to KPMG’s sustainability strategy and reporting. These topics help ensure alignment with both our strategic priorities and CSRD requirements.

Double Materiality Assessment

ESG categories	Material topic	ESRS
Environmental	Climate change	ESRS E1 (Climate change)
Social	Health & well-being	ESRS S1 (Own workforce)
	Learning & development	ESRS S1 (Own workforce)
	Inclusion, diversity, and equity	ESRS S1 (Own workforce)
	Local communities	ESRS S3 (Affected communities)
	Privacy and data security	ESRS S4 (Consumers and end-users)
Governance	Corporate culture and ethical business practices, integrity, and independence	ESRS G1 (Governance, risk management, and internal control)
Company specific	Quality and impact of services and trust in the capital markets	Company specific

Gap analysis and EU Taxonomy alignment

In addition to the DMA, a comprehensive gap analysis was conducted to evaluate our current sustainability practices against CSRD requirements. This analysis helped identify areas where improvements are needed to ensure full compliance with the Directive.
Furthermore, we assessed our alignment with the EU Taxonomy, focusing on how our activities contribute to the EU’s environmental objectives. Taken together, this helps ensure that our sustainability reporting reflects both regulatory expectations and our commitment to transparency in environmental performance and sustainable economic activities.

Next steps

Following the completion of the DMA, our next steps will focus on translating our findings into actionable plans to reach CSRD compliance by 2026. We aim to set targets for our material topics to help guide our sustainability efforts. A comprehensive implementation roadmap will outline the necessary steps to achieve these targets. Additionally, we will refine our governance structure, update policies, and enhance our reporting framework to align with CSRD requirements, setting the foundation for transparent and consistent sustainability reporting moving forward.