What IT companies should know about ESG adoption trends
IT companies are increasingly receiving ESG requests from clients and partners, and to respond to them systematically, businesses need to understand how sustainability requirements are changing worldwide and in Ukraine. Oleksii Yatsiuk, ESG Expert at the Green Transition Office, outlined these trends at the open online meeting “ESG for IT Companies: Client Requests, Partner Requirements and Practical Solutions”, organised by the Green Transition Office, KSE Business School and Diia.City Union.
He explained that ESG is a system for managing the non-financial risks and opportunities that affect a company’s long-term resilience, so it runs through the whole of a company’s management and is directly linked to access to finance and to the requirements of partners and regulators. A company starts with a sustainability strategy and a plan for delivering it, then builds the relevant practices into its operations and prepares its reporting.
Only a few years ago ESG reporting was voluntary and often showcased nothing but positive projects, whereas governments in the EU and the US are now introducing mandatory standards under which reports must be machine-readable and disclose every aspect of a company’s activities, including those that could damage its reputation. For companies with up to 1,000 employees that fall outside mandatory reporting under the CSRD, the EU provides a voluntary standard based on the VSME, which limits the ESG information that value chain participants can request from them. Through these requests, European requirements reach suppliers, including IT companies working with clients in the EU.
For investors, ESG factors have become a source of financial risks and opportunities that shape a company’s future value, while banks take them into account when assessing credit risk and the terms of financing. According to the figures he cited, global ESG investment has exceeded USD 35 trillion, and 89% of global investors already integrate ESG factors into their strategies.
In Ukraine, the Ministry of Finance is preparing legislative changes to introduce mandatory sustainability reporting, and the Ministry of Economy and Environment has drafted a bill on a taxonomy of sustainable activities and sustainable investment. Ukrainian businesses broadly support these changes but are far less ready to put them into practice, according to a 2025 Green Transition Office survey in which 87% of companies backed the introduction of ESG standards while only 5% said they were ready to report. Some 68% of respondents named the collection and processing of large volumes of ESG data as a problem, and 87% believe digital solutions will improve their readiness to report, which creates demand for products that Ukrainian IT companies can build.
The recording of the meeting is available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bSmtu3RsZeg, and the speakers’ presentations can be downloaded here https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1GzV4MyRc8g2xab8L-PgTCb1W2Rz8MXyn?usp=sharing
The Green Transition Office is an independent advisory body under the Ministry of Economy and Environment of Ukraine that helps to implement reforms in the field of green transition, energy and climate policy of Ukraine. The Green Transition Office operates with the financial support of the UK Agency for International Development and is implemented by DiXi Group.
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