Nature and scope of our work
The work described below was performed in accordance with the provisions of Article A.225-1 et seq. of the French Commercial Code, as well as with the professional guidance of the French Institute of Statutory Auditors (Compagnie nationale des commissaires aux comptes or CNCC) applicable to such engagements and with ISAE 3000(1) :
- we obtained an understanding of all the consolidated entities’ activities, and the description of the principal risks associated;
- we assessed the suitability of the criteria of the Guidelines with respect to their relevance, completeness, reliability, neutrality and understandability, with due consideration of industry best practices, where appropriate;
- we verified that the Statement includes each category of social and environmental information set out in article L.225-102-1 III as well as information regarding compliance with human rights and anti-corruption and tax avoidance legislation;
- we verified that the Statement provides the information required under article R.225-105 II of the French Commercial Code, where relevant with respect to the principal risks, and includes, where applicable, an explanation for the absence of the information required under article L.225-102-1 III, paragraph 2 of the French Commercial Code;
- we verified that the Statement presents the business model and a description of principal risks associated with all the consolidated entities’ activities, including where relevant and proportionate, the risks associated with their business relationships, their products or services, as well as their policies, measures and the outcomes thereof, including key performance indicators associated to the principal risks;
- we referred to documentary sources and conducted interviews to:
- assess the process used to identify and confirm the principal risks as well as the consistency of the outcomes, including the key performance indicators used, with respect to the principal risks and the policies presented,
- corroborate the qualitative information (measures and outcomes) that we considered the most important and presented in Appendix. Concerning certain risks(2), our work was carried out on the consolidating entity, for the other risks, our work was carried out on the consolidating entity and on a selection of entities(3) ;
- we verified that the Statement covers the scope of consolidation, i.e. all the consolidated entities in accordance with article L.233-16 of the French Commercial Code within the limitations set out in the Statement;
- we obtained an understanding of internal control and risk management procedures the entity has put in place and assessed the data collection process to ensure the completeness and fairness of the Information;
- for the key performance indicators and other quantitative outcomes that we considered to be the most important presented in Appendix, we implemented:
- analytical procedures to verify the proper consolidation of the data collected and the consistency of any changes in those data,
- tests of details, using sampling techniques, in order to verify the proper application of the definitions and procedures and reconcile the data with the supporting documents. This work was carried out on a selection(3) of contributing entities4 and covers between 37% and 55% of the consolidated data selected for these tests;
- we assessed the overall consistency of the Statement based on our knowledge of all the consolidated entities.
We believe that the work carried out, based on our professional judgment, is sufficient to provide a basis for our limited assurance conclusion; a higher level of assurance would have required us to carry out more extensive procedures.
Means and resources
Our work was carried out by a team of nine people between July and October 2020 and took a total of twelve weeks.
We were assisted in our work by our specialists in sustainable development and corporate social responsibility. We conducted some fifteen interviews with the people responsible for preparing the Statement.
