Page 79 - Special Topic Session (STS) - Volume 2

STS461 Maciej T.
5. Way ahead – how is your company going to contribute to the SDGs in the
course of the next 2-3 years?

One of the challenges, particularly regarding ‘question 4’ was selection of
relevant targets/indicators for the questionnaire. As only few, if any, indicators
can be directly linked to the areas of work of private companies, it was decided
only to select relevant targets, as their application can be extended to also
include private sector activities. Here, 21 targets were selected. The goal is also
to group the responses by industries and also, where possible, to disaggregate
industries into more detailed levels.
One of the important challenges/considerations that could be mentioned,
was whether companies should be asked about additional actions regarding
the SDGs or whether it was sufficient to refer to already existing operations.
The main concern behind this consideration was, whether we only should
measure how the 2030 agenda impacts the activities of companies or also
include general operations of companies as SDG relevant. In this line, other
consideration was whether the questionnaire will address future activities or
also past/ongoing. Here, it was decided to measure all activities that could
relate to the 2030 agenda after it was adopted.
The overarching question is also who will be the users of the data on
private sector as a whole – would it be general public or would data also have
appeal to other users, such as investors? The latter would set new demands
on data, including answers to the challenging issue of data confidentiality and
privacy of statistical units.

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The project will open for a possibility for private sector companies to link
to their descriptions of SDG activities. One the one hand, this could encourage
companies to participate in the questionnaire and on the other, to
complement the results of the questionnaire with information that may not be
strictly perceived as statistical, but still considered as relevant by the users.

3. Results
Statistics Denmark has asked around 600 larger Danish enterprises about
their activities relating to the SDG. A total of 178 major Danish companies have
responded to the survey on the business community's commitment to the
UN's world goals. The result can hardly be perceived as representative for
smaller enterprises and the extent to which they are representative for larger
enterprises can be discussed.
Of the 178 companies, nearly 120 responded that they think the global
goals into the company's activities. This corresponds to approx. 2/3 of the

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