Towards a Commonly Accepted ESG Reporting Template for Greek and Cypriot SMEs

Environmental, social, and governance (ESG) reporting is a revolution in the operation of businesses. In recent years, more and more businesses are required or decide to publish corporate sustainability reports that highlight their performance in the envi-ronmental, social, and intergovernmental pillar. The recent Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) includes small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the context of mandatory ESG reporting. The goal of this paper is to provide a model ESG reporting framework to assist Cypriot and Greek SMEs in collecting and disclosing relevant data. A study was conducted to assess the readiness of Greek and Cypriot SMEs to engage in ESG reporting. The results revealed a relatively low level of maturity in this regard. At the same time, there is growing demand to develop a more cost-effective, user friendly, and straightforward ESG framework.