A fund manager friend of mine once showed me two ESG rating reports on the same Indian cement company, from two different global rating agencies. One had the company near the top of its sector. The other had it near the bottom. Same company. Same quarter. Same publicly available data. "Which one do I trust?" he asked. "Neither, fully," I said. "But that's the job, isn't it?" This is the strange world ESG ratings live in. They carry huge influence — investors use them to alloc

ESG Just Stopped Being a Marketing Story For about a decade, ESG in the UAE meant the same thing in most boardrooms. A glossy annual report. A few photos of solar panels. A community engagement page. Maybe a paragraph from the Chairman about sustainability values. The Marketing department wrote it. The board signed it. Everyone moved on. That era ended on 30 May 2025. That's when Federal Decree-Law No. 11 of 2024, the UAE Climate Law, came into force. Full compliance is due 3

For a long time, investors believed the numbers told the whole story. Revenue, margins, earnings per share — that was enough. But financial statements don’t produce themselves. People produce them. And people operate within a culture. The “Social” in ESG is not about charity or branding. It is about human capital, incentives, leadership tone, and workplace norms. It is about whether employees feel safe reporting issues, whether finance teams are pressured to “make the numbers

1. The ESG Reset A Fresh Beginning: Why 2026 Feels New Earlier, ESG discussions mostly circled around forms, disclosures and attractive sustainability booklets. That phase has clearly passed. In 2026, ESG strategy is not sitting quietly inside the compliance department anymore—it is part of business planning and corporate strategy. Directors are not just thinking, “Did we file everything?” They are thinking, “Can this company survive shocks and future risks?” This transition

Corporate strategies across the globe have rapidly shifted to include Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) commitments. i.e., Corporations are publishing Sustainability Reports, committing to Net-Zero targets and promoting sustainable-oriented products and/or services within their business operations. The emergence of a serious governance issue called Greenwashing has occurred side-by-side with the rise in corporate sustainability communications. Greenwashing happens wh

There’s something slightly strange about how sustainability is talked about today. Every company seems to have a climate story. Open any annual report and you’ll find pages on carbon targets, responsible sourcing, ESG performance, net-zero roadmaps. The language is confident. The graphics are polished. The commitments stretch to 2030, 2040, and 2050. And yet, the more companies talk about being green, the more the word greenwashing shows up in headlines. That tension is hard

Boards used to meet, nod politely at the numbers, and think they were safe. ESG? That was “CSR’s problem,” something you put in a report no one read. Fast forward to today, and that casual shrug could cost you millions — and your reputation — because ESG failures are now triggering real Director Liability . Imagine this: a company releases a glossy sustainability report. Big headlines, bold promises, fancy charts. “Net-zero by 2030!” the CEO beams. Investors are impressed. Em

What does it really mean for a company to succeed? People argue about this everywhere—from boardrooms to courtrooms to business schools. The question seems simple but the answers are all over the map. Most laws tell company directors to act in the “best interests of the company” or to “promote the success of the corporation.” But let us be honest—nobody agrees on what success actually means. Is it just making money fast? Is it about growth over decades? Winning the market? Sa

The automotive sector is currently at a critical juncture in its history. For decades, discussions around production efficiency, safety regulations and evolving customer demands shaped the industry. Today, however, a more complex and consequential dialogue has taken centre stage—Responsible Business Conduct in the Automotive Sector. This is not just another sustainability buzzword. Responsible Business Conduct (RBC) is rapidly becoming a gateway to future competitiveness, boa