Creative Commons

In recent years, businesses come across with a huge number of economic, social and environmental issues. In order to find a balance between them, it is considered useful to set the risks down along with the measures every company should take, and publish the necessary information, under the supervision of the European Union and more specifically according to the European Directives 2013/34/EU and 2014/95/EU (CSR Initiatives). Businesses that are established or operating in Greece are obliged to follow the EU Directive 4403/2016. The main purpose of this dissertation was to study and evaluate the level that Greek businesses integrate non-financial information into their annual financial reports through reviewing a quiet representative sample of 50 businesses with a presence in the Greek Stock Market for the reporting period 1/1/2017-31/12/2017. After the analysis, the comprehensiveness of the non-financial information provided in the sample is quantitatively and qualitatively evaluated based on the corresponding legislation requirements. Lastly, a qualitative evaluation is conducted so to extract the conclusions and to suggest some important changes regarding businesses operation, in order to fulfill the EU Directive’s requirements. After a long and deep research, it is noticeable that entities who are obliged to follow the Law 4403/2016, abstain from reporting non-financial information at a large scale. It is remarkable that most businesses prefer to present information about the environmental and the social impacts of the company rather than performing a total portrayal of the company’s performance according to the Greek Legislation.